Not My First Rodeo

Dents and dings notwithstanding, one can tell how much time one has behind the wheel
by looking no further than the defect card after making relief. Senior operators can roll
with whatever they have been given. Others, take “safety significant” to levels seen
only at the National Security Agency. The biggest variable to accepting equipment,
headway, and, as training calls; weather, traffic, and operator; is the personality and
style of who is behind the wheel. We have terms for the style of movement an operator
has during his or her run. I have a reputation as a runner. With Mars in Aries and my
second house rising in Leo, I have a charismatic demeanor that may come across as
non-diplomatic, though I love to show my sunny side. This, however, can get lost in my
strong desire to go: Mars in Aries, born in New York, “We gotta go!!”

Anyway, I see how what may be a good schedule during one sign-up can be come a
set-up for failure in another, depending upon the headway between transfer coaches,
leaving time of a leader, and how fast one can push stale greens. I have learned to eat
fresh greens, and this pause at a stoplight has turned my style in to that of being a good
guy. By stopping well behind the crosswalk or stop line, and looking at the “show” on
the street, all is calm, all is well. Turk, Eddy, Post, Harrison, and Kansas are streets,
just to name a few, whereby I do a self-check-in to see if I am pushing ahead or laying
back.

The space cushion we are seen observing by driving down the hash mark of a two lane
street, is actually a safety method which pays dividends at crosswalks and busy corners
with bikes and pedestrians. By stopping back from the stop line, all problems with
conflict at intersections has reduced dramatically. Problems now equal zero. The
recent paint request to install a chain of triangles behind the stop line, has been a great

help for motorists to observe our passive example of keeping a space cushion in those
crosswalk areas where pedestrians don’t stay between the lines. You can see these
triangles at Francisco and Columbus by the Wharf, and near UPS at 16th and Utah.
Use of the horn has gone to zero, as have car horns directed at me. Operators with a
reputation of dragging the line and that use the horn are, quite frankly, an
embarrassment to me, and I have had to leave the bus, if I am a passenger in transit,
on their coach. Indeed, diplomacy with co-workers is perhaps, at the end of the day, the
biggest challenge to face with time behind the wheel. Did my hand signal to move up to
the top of the zone at the terminal actually show an angry hostile flip-off with fingertips
down, in a condescending brush-off motion, or was it an Alleluia, praise God, hands up,
palms facing, show of Grace! I am reminded of how often it is not what is said, but the
“tone” with which it is “said.”