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Roger Rabbits with |
I had oodles of love and support squirreled away in readiness for National Bus Driver Appreciation Day last Sunday. But then I encountered someone I thought more deserving.
He was in a bakery grabbing a cheeky, sneaky, sausage roll. Young and tall young man, a fine bit of Kiwi manhood, in a stab-proof vest and the sullied, albeit still proud, blue uniform of the New Zealand Police.
In the last hour he’d probably knocked on someone’s door to tell them a son or daughter had been killed in a crash. Or he’d saved a poor woman and child from being thrashed senseless by some meth-addled, entitled, ape. Or maybe he’d collared some dirtbag who’d trashed and plundered someone’s house. So who would begrudge him timeout for a sausage roll?
Yet I sensed he sensed the stench from an institution scandalised and contaminated by McSkimming-gate had wafted into the bakery after him; and everyone was gagging, staring and judging. Probably right.
An ugly fog
That’s when I blurted out something inane and gaggingly saccharine, but which felt right at the time: “We still appreciate what you guys do. We still love our cops”. See what I mean? Vomit!
The policeman, now drizzled with pastry crumbs, smiled and said something like “Thank you, that’s appreciated”. Hope he didn’t put his greasy hands all over his baton or taser. And now there will be crumbs in the footwell of the cop car.
This cop-ophile had an immediate ‘helpers high’ – you know that rush of positivity, that rush of chemicals in the brain’s pleasure and reward department from a simple act of kindness or niceness. Courtesy and niceness cost nothing and give everything. How virtuous.
A photo appeared in the dailies last week – the latest echelon of recruits from the police college in Porirua. With an ugly fog of objectionable publications, child exploitation and bestiality swirling overhead, they could be forgiven for questioning their career choice.
They probably signed up out of a sense of duty, a desire to help and keep us safe, to fight injustice, to have a positive impact. A bit of excitement and challenge along the way. Well, one particularly bad apple and another dubious one changes nothing. Have a long, fulfilling and honorable career guys.
Why love a bus driver?
Which leads me back to National Bus Driver Appreciation Day last Sunday, when regional council asked us to say something nice to a bus driver. Why do bus drivers get singled out for special love? And forgiveness?
“You’re quarter of an hour late. Again! But we are blessed to be served by you.” Or: “You have missed my stop. But I will walk back in the rain to show my love”. Or, when you’re stuck in a peak-hour snarl-up en route from Papa-bloody-moa: “Hey driver, we’re not going anywhere so how about a group hug and a ‘kumbaya’ with the passengers?”
Why the outpouring for bus drivers? What about the unfortunate and unloved poo farm workers, our city’s embalmers, or people who live in Hamilton? And don’t forget our gastroenterologists and butchers. I suspect they might need a smile and some cradling and caressing too. They might need a special day.
Nothing is for nothing
Last Sunday’s Bus Driver Appreciation Day raised a couple of other issues for me.
Like the so-called ‘free off-peak travel’ for us ‘near-deads’ – us super-entitled SuperGold card-toting oldies. Well, we all know there is no such thing as a free lunch. Uh-huh!
If I did take one bus ride this financial year it would actually cost me $302.98 – because that’s my passenger transport levy that I pay as a part of my Bay of Plenty Regional Council rates bill. So nothing is for nothing!
Perhaps I should also spend a contemplative Sunday afternoon in a suburban bus shelter because I understand part of my Tauranga City Council rates bill goes towards their instalment and upkeep. I’ll spread a rug over my knees, with a thermos of Chamomile Herbal Infusion in hand and count the buses and passengers (or lack of). That’s some high excitement for my money.
But I probably won’t take that bus trip until I am forced to – until the TCC finally strangles the life from free all-day parking down Cameron Rd.
What would ya
There has to be an incentive to get out of your car and onto a bus, and I can’t see one yet… Why would I spend at least an hour walking to and from bus stops, and navigate a bunch of change of buses, when I can drive that 3km to work in 10 minutes? Why would ya?
Perhaps the bus drivers might want to have an Appreciation Day for my subsidising their jobs and the empty yellow buses travelling all ways at all times.
After Appreciation Day what happens on the other 364 days of the year? Do we just revert to giving the bussies gyp, complaining and being our normal rude, inconsiderate and offensive selves?
On Monday morning (just gone) I thought the spirit of Bus Driver Appreciation Day might have lived on overnight. But I wished for too much. Because when I waved out to a bus driver downtown – and showed some belated Appreciation Day appreciation – he just gawked suspiciously at me. You could see him thinking: ‘Weirdo!’ He was too long a bus driver, too damaged by rude passengers. Then he drove off in his empty bus. He was probably worried about getting nobody somewhere on time.
In hindsight, I should have paid for that cop’s sausage roll.