The Magic School Bus

recipe: spicy olive lamb meatballs

My Childhood home on Google Maps, taken Sept 2023.

Glenda was my bus driver from kindergarten to sixth grade. She had a striking resemblance to my mother. In many ways she was a mother to the kids on the bus. She’d sit last in the line of school buses collecting the masses as we vacated the school in the echoes of the last bell. The door was always ajar even on the coldest wintery days. The drivers seat appeared to be worn from years of accommodation, probably fitted to Glenda.

The route was (almost) always the same. The door would hinge shut from her firm grip on the handle. The bus would kick into first gear and our little bodies were jolted into motion. The windows on the bus didn’t allow for much air. Half of the windows were stuck shut due to rust from harsh east coast conditions or a lack of WD-40.

Historically, sixth graders sat in the back and K-2 were towards the front. Seat belts weren’t required on the bus, however, the seats were fitted with the suggestion of a seat belt. The old narrow roads of Chaplin brought the bus close to natures touch. Overgrown trees would whip into the open windows and on a rare occasion during snow cover the bus would get stuck attempting to climb Tower Hill Road.

Glenda had a “no bullshit” attitude. Like a true clairvoyant her eyes would appear in the rearview mirror with glaring accuracy. The singe of her gaze could be enough to settle any ruckus. She could do a whole lot with not much but a look. I can count on one hand the times she stopped the bus on the side of the road and stood up from the drivers seat to sort us out. Only in those moments did we all realize how short she was or what she actually sounded like.

Bullying was prominent on our bus, it was a form of currency. When I was in kindergarten, a foul-mouthed sixth grader named Carol-Ann was remarking on how I sat alone proving no one wanted to be friends with me. This wasn’t her first offense. Usually, Carol-Ann would walk the isle towards the back of the bus and snicker along the way. One day I decided I had enough. I pivoted, ensuring my head was visible over the long back of the seat. With the confidence and fright of a coiled viper I retorted, “You know what Carol-Ann, no one likes you because you’re fat.” The pain, the accuracy, the sharpness of my tongue became a measure of self-defense I’d carry well into adulthood.

Glenda kept me in line. Her voice deepened when she needed to reestablish order. “Hey, don’t you fucking talk to her like that.” Where was Glenda when Carol-Ann was being a total bitch? Glenda knew I was above the fold in her own way. Her lips would raise when I ascended the steps of the bus, some affirming sign she was a guardian angel.

Towards the end of elementary school there was a brief moment where I wasn’t allowed to ride the bus due to violent behavior. I certainly wasn’t popular and neither was Timothy Walsh. “Lord of the Flies” was required reading in grade school. The fictitious text wasn’t far from reality. Status was all we had in addition to attention and material goods. Timothy was piling the shit on thick and I snapped. I leapt over my seat like a hawk ascending upon it’s prey. Using the force of my body, I followed through with the ultimate bitch slap I’ve yet to reenact to this day.

Glenda was pissed or disappointed, I couldn’t tell. My parents would pick me up and drop me off from school for the remainder of the year. My attitude changed but my grades didn’t. I had rage in me, so much of it. Rage had manifested in an attention deficit. The following year I was forced to wear a headset during class while the teacher wore a mic attached to battery pack that was barely charged.

During fifth and sixth grade I was able to ride the bus again. In rejoining the group of kids on the bus I was newly meditative during the ride. I would enjoy feeling the shitty faint breeze whisper through the window. The same tree branches made an appearance through the cracks in the windows. The molten plastic of the brown seat covering made dewy ass prints in the early summer, all the makings of being a passenger on Glenda’s bus.

I chatted with Glenda on many rides. I asked her how long she’d been a bus driver, what she did during the day, which soaps she watched in between the morning and the afternoon. I told her how my family had a bartering system with a neighboring apple orchard. “Yeah, my dad just fixes their tractor equipment and we get cider and apples and never pay.” She seemed interested in me in how I’d been so mean and now proving to be the ideal passenger.

During sixth grade I found myself with the closest feeling to friends I had since starting elementary school. I went from sitting right behind Glenda to all the way in the last seat. In the back the suspension was wonky or stiff as shit, I couldn’t tell. Coincidentally, I was one of the last kids off the bus. Perhaps the route did change yearly to get the youngest kids home first.

Glenda relaxed a lot of the bus etiquette during these remaining months as our driver. She played the radio and we’d sing Vitamin C’s “Graduation” or Crazy Town’s “Butterfly.” The easiest to remember parts of the song were sung loudly. “Come my lady, come, come my lady. You’re my butterfly, sugar, baby.” Just as our sing-a-long was getting heightened Glenda was laughing and gunned it for a bump in the road sure to rocket us from our seats. Barreling down Davis Road, Glenda was laser focused and as we hit the bump we grabbed the seat backs as our heads thudded against the ceiling. “Oh my god,” part laughing, part in shock, Glenda in the depths of her voice asked if we were okay. We sunk into the lack of a seat cushion and could barely catch our breaths from exhilaration.

After leaving elementary school, I thought that’d be the last of Glenda. My years in middle school were short, only seventh and eighth grade were spent at Parish Hill High School (my brothers alma mater). On a rainy spring day, to my surprise, Glenda was our substitute bus driver. She looked half happy to see me, still giving a similar raise of the lips in confirmation. I sat in the front and asked how things were. She told me about the drama at the bus dispatch and all the new routes. She asked for my help, a first. “Which way do we go?” Due to my assistance, I was the last one dropped off, the sun now sinking into the tree line.

As we approached 101 Ridge Road, Glenda asked how I was. I told her about my parents divorce and a silence washed over the conversation. “I can’t even imagine how you must feel.” Her sentiment stayed with me for a while. Somehow she was a guardian angel the way she affirmed my situation. But in a classic, emotionally removed Eastern Connecticut way, Glenda’s hand reached for the handle opening the doors. “I’ll see you around,” she said.

Right before I moved in with my father I absorbed my childhood home one last time. The garden had become overwrought with weeds and miscellaneous vegetation. The wooden fence my father and mother built was beginning to show seasonal wear. The traffic on Ridge Road was light, but steady enough for us to lose our cat Lacey of 13 years a month prior. I sat beneath the White Ash tree, the only tree in the front yard. I heard a bus coming down the road. I looked up and there was Glenda, she looked over and waved. I dreamt about Glenda that night, perhaps she was the first friend I ever had.

My childhood home on Google Maps, taken August 2011.