The joy in inconvenience

Dave drove me to work and dropped me off in front of my office building on Thursday morning. I had to prepare for a morning meeting and there was no way I could have moved my tooshie out the door early enough to bike the almost 1 hour ride in, shower, and be decent-looking enough for a meeting. It wasn't going to happen. 

It also meant that for the first time in awhile I would be taking the bus home. What a pain. I mean, I've gotten so used to being on my bike where I can just take off whenever I please. Taking the bus would mean that I only have a way home once an hour (regardless of whether I used city or university bus). Of course with temperatures in the mid 90's, picking city bus vs. university bus just wasn't a hard decision. The pick up spots were both about a 15 minute walk from my office and within a few minutes of each other, but taking the university bus would mean a 30 minute walk home in the hot Texas sun, whereas the city bus would only mean a 15 minute walk. Who needs exercise? I'll ride my bike tomorrow. City bus it is!

When the three hour long meeting broke, the participants bolted from the room (I kid you not). Since I was sure the head of the meeting would want to talk to me about our next moves on the project, I (against my better judgement) stuck around while he talked for another 45 minutes. That put me at 12:45 and REALLY hungry for that lunch I had packed and which sat patiently waiting for me in my office. I could hear that homemade potato salad calling me.... Heather.... did you forget me?... Hellooooooo?...

But 12:40 also meant that if I was going to catch the city bus (which again only runs once per hour), I needed to be at the bus stop at 1:20 or risk missing it for the next hour (I was really missing my bike at this point). At a brisk pace (I would have run, but my arms were full to capacity with all those silly handouts we distributed at the meeting), I walked back over to my building, took the elevator to the third floor (it's actually slower than the stairs - I've raced my friends up, so believe me I know - but with all that stuff in my arms, I wasn't risking a broken neck...), ducked in my office, changed quickly into a pair of shorts (trust me, I can give Superman a run for his money on the whole speed dressing thing), and with lunch box in hand, raced back out the door. By 1:05, I was at the bus stop on my favorite bench with a good 15 minutes to nibble on lunch before the bus came. 

Sure, I nibbled. I ate my cheese and spinach sandwich, my cucumber slices, and that potato salad. It was all good, but my favorite part, what I enjoy doing more than almost anything, is people-watching. And boy is that the spot to do it. It's just on the north side of the university campus where everyone hangs out - lovers hold hands, incoming freshman try to look cool while they walk around with their parents in tow, the pizza guy takes off on his bike to get the pies to their destination while still warm, big hair, cowboy boots, lots and lots of bicycles... it's a people-watchers paradise. I like creating stories for each of them in my head - where they're going or where they just came from, do they look happy or sad and why. And every once in awhile someone will smile and say "hi," or stop to talk. 

And the more I thought about it, the more I realized how silly I was for complaining about not having my bike. I would have just sped home and not seen or talked to anyone. Now, here I was enjoying my time on this bench. Yep, even though the sun was bearing down on me and sweat was oozing out of every pore, I was having fun! 

You know, we drive our cars because they get us where we want to go faster. We use our dishwashers so we don't waste time washing the dishes. We pay someone else to mow our lawns so we can be inside doing... whatever it is we do in the nice cool air conditioning. It saves us time, right? It saves us energy, right? But time and energy that we'd rather be doing what? Because sweaty, hot, and at least no longer hungry, the inconvenience of actually having to wait for the bus meant fresh air in my lungs, being still for a few minutes and becoming aware of the world around me; it meant a homemade lunch on a park bench, the time for my imagination to run wild as I watched the world pass.  This so called "inconvenience," it turns out, was really just joy in disguise.

Live each season as it passes; breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit, and resign yourself to the influences of each -- Henry David Thoreau