Bus ride
26 September 2020A number of my pictures feature mass transit, most of them trains. Trains, particularly those outside the United States, are fascinating. Trains have hosted for the many few an eccentric hobby and even spawned wars. In pictures their presence can be striking. When trains appear in the frames, they must have placed the photographer on notice; the photographer, railfan or not, will certainly have composed with them or around them.
The pictures also feature buses, although there are not many of them like trains. Unlike trains that get top billing, buses are lucky to get the last. Buses do not count on memorable liveries or new technologies to make their impression. While dull and familiar, they still bring you anxiety with uncertainty in their design. To know the miracle of getting where they can take you, you agree to assume their turbulence and to take on effort on your part. It is you who must hail for their attention, and you are to trace your own route along the trivial stops.
When the scrolling panes show the cues that the time is right, you may finally buzz and exit. While the buses themselves will fade away into things less than props, you may find that anxiety has blended into excitement. You may find that the destinations have eroded. Oddly enough, that part was not so important after all.
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