Bus Story: Crazy Joel
Met a guy I'm going to fondly call "Crazy Joel" (not to be confused with Sexy Joel Madison) on the 734 on Tuesday. Crazy Joel looks a lot like Christopher Lloyd in Back to the Future with a few wisps of hair trying to escape the top of his head and bushy black eyebrows that turn straight up on the ends. He was on his way back to the valley from a seminar at UCLA on Learning and Memory. It's been a hobby of his ever since he retired a few years ago. He likes to leave the house only once a week and this was it.
Joel is a germaphobe who clutched his sweater in a ball under his arm, but comically kept dropping his water bottle on the dirty sidewalk before we boarded the bus and then three more times after we sat down inside. Before retirement he was an electrical engineer who built missiles in a bunker somewhere he preferred not to divulge. But the missiles he built were made only to shoot down other missiles, not planes and he was happy about that. He referenced a few physicists I hadn't heard of, but I'm sure my daughter Sarah would have known about.
Joel has a girlfriend he's been with for 8 years and they go to Mozart parties -- another thing I'd never heard of -- where people bring their instruments and play Mozart together. Sounds pretty cool to me. He owns a flip phone because he doesn't want to be tracked by anyone, and he only banks in person. When I mentioned television to him he says he cut the cord years ago and now only gets what's free. When he retired, he said, he wanted the demarkation to be not just about his work life, but also in his personal life. He now listens to more music, reads more books, takes longer walks, and rides the bus (something I can relate to).
I'm really hoping I run into Joel again. I feel like I could learn a lot about letting go of the things I've grown so attached to that don't add nearly This week I paid for a very grateful, 20-something's ride on the 240 after her TAP card was declined. The same day I returned a lost handbag I found at the Weyburn stop to a woman from Sunland who said her meds were causing her to blackout so she couldn't even retrace her steps to figure out where she had lost it. Later that day my accountant tells me I owe a crap-ton in taxes. So I cut a check. You're welcome, America. Please spend it wisely on worthwhile things like affordable college tuition and better mental health care.