The Bus Of higher Learning
Her name was Miss Hightower, and I was in love.
I loved the way she said Detroit. Long drawn-out D. Like Deetroit. I was on my way to see my dad and my grandma, and I was riding in style on an American icon, a Greyhound bus. Until this day, I had ridden the train, rode in a car, and flown on a DC 10 aircraft. But this day I was cruising the Midwest interstate highways in a tinted window, black smoke breathing, chrome cruiser. And at the wheel of this beautiful machine was Ms. Hightower.
It was evident at the onset of boarding the bus that she took no shit from anyone. She was a tall black woman with beautiful, straight, shoulder length hair, very defined facial features, beautiful lips with a small amount of red lipstick applied, and I couldn’t help but notice how form fitting her uniform was.
More than that, I was enamored with how confident she was. How she took charge of the passengers and how she commanded the road with one of the coolest pieces mass transit ever invented. The Greyhound bus.
As I spent the Christmas season with my Michigan family, I couldn’t help but wonder if I would get the strong and beautiful miss Hightower on the return trip.
Christmas with my family went way too fast, as it always did, but as my dad and I walked through the bus station to my terminal the excitement began building about my return trip. Perhaps I would once again be riding across the Frozen Tundra under the steady driving hands of the beautiful miss Hightower.
Alas as we approached my terminal the sadness of not seeing my dad again until next year began to swell and cascade down upon me like an avalanche, burying my excitement, drowning out the warm inviting thoughts of miss Hightower. This would set the stage for my return trip, a much darker, gritty, more sobering experience.
I reluctantly hugged my dad goodbye and climbed aboard the silver road rocket of interstate transit. I noticed this bus did not have the same style and nostalgic panache as the first ride. The air was stuffy and smelled of sour gym socks, this… was just a bus. I found my seat about 5 rows back and to my left. I slid all the way to the window indicating that the other part of seat was available, and frankly, I would rather stare out the window as the time and miles between my dad and I slipped further and further away.
As I was drifting in and out of my daydream lament, I was startled by the voice of an annoyed woman. “You there, white boy, get up out dat seat!”. I looked up to see who she was hollerin’ at, and to my dismay I was the only white boy on the bus.
I froze, I didn’t know what to do… I was literally scared speechless. Our eyes met, she was an older big black woman donned with beautiful, almost regal, attire. A long flowing purple coat outline in animal fur, a colorful scarf and a garish hat that no one where I came from could ever wear, but she looked magnificent.
“White boy, I’m talkin to you!”, “get ya ass up out my seat, ain’t no white boy gonna take my seat at the front of the bus.” “I sat in the back a da bus way too godt damn long for yo skinny ass not to move.”
“Yes ma’am” is all I could squeak out as a slid out of my seat to let this woman take her rightful place, wherever she wanted on the bus. As I stood up, I couldn’t help but think about how terrible it must have been for her to be treated as less than human wherever she grew up, to be so looked down upon. It only took a few seconds of me standing up and into the aisle for me to realize I now had a new problem. There were no empty seats. At least there were no seats available for me. A sudden hot flash of fear overcame me. Was I going to have to stand for the whole trip? Why wasn’t the diver doing anything? I know he could hear what was going on. Why couldn’t I have miss Hightower for a driver. She would have sorted this out immediately. I wanted to cry, but didn’t want to show, weakness.
Right at the precipice of my emotional wave I hear a voice, a gruff, old, southern Baptist preacher man’s voice. “Come on over hear-uh and set down by me white boy. Pay no never mind to them ladies up
they-uh “
As I lifted my head and shifted my eyes from the floor towards the sound of the voice, I saw the face and knew immediately to whom this voice belonged. A thin, weathered old man with a square jawline that was adorned with a few days’ growth of silver whiskers. He was tailored in a brownish grey pinstripe suit and topped with a brown fedora of types. His eyes dark brown, with deep crow’s feet that carried the weight of the world and yet I could see the warmth of his soul peering through the round wire rimmed glasses as he invited me to sit next to him.
Willie Brown was his name, at least that is what he called himself. An old blues man from Mississippi. As the bus began to rumble down the highway Willie pulled out a harmonica and began to play and sing blues songs. I felt like I had a front row seat at a one-person concert, it felt like a historic moment was taking place. I for a few brief hours was part of something so much bigger than myself. I felt tapped into a place and time that I had no right to be in. But here I was… A white kid… the only white person on the bus, who only moments earlier was being scorned and booted from his seat was now being ushered in to a sacred place. I was experiencing Willie Brown the blues harp player from Mississippi as we hurtled down the highways and byways in a Greyhound bus.
Somewhere between Detroit and Gary Indiana my time with Willie ended, but not before he taught me about life in the south, woman, music and offering me a swig from his bottle of Whiskey.
As we moved on toward Chicago, with a now half full bus, I was still thinking about Willie and regretting not taking a swig or two from his bottle, the man in the seat in front of me leaned over the back with a huge smile and asked, “Hey young white boy, you got room in that seat for me?” I of course said, “yes sir would you like window or aisle?”
He said, “great I don’t like traveling alone”. As we exchanged pleasantries he asked where I was headed, I told him Wisconsin. He turned to look at me with boyish grin and said, “I bet I know of a place in Wisconsin that you have never heard of”. I said, “yeah where is that?” He smiled even bigger and said,” Oxford”! Without hesitation I said, “I know right where that is”! His smile now turned to a puzzled look… and with some hesitation he asked, “why would a young white boy like you know where Oxford, Wisconsin is?” I quickly replied, “my mother used to work at the Federal prison there”. He seemed to get a little uncomfortable and said oh what is you mom’s name? For reasons only known to God, I told a complete stranger my mom’s name.
His face began beaming. “You’re miss Connie’s boy?… he said it again only with much more joy and enthusiasm, “Your mis Connie’s boy”?… “Miss Connie changed my life”. “Miss Connie helped me get my high school education; Miss Connie taught me to read”! “Miss Connie was the book lady”. “You tell miss Connie when you get home that you sat with LeRoy Robinson and LeRoy says thank you.” (name changed for protection of the now free man who served his time)
I don’t remember much of the ride after that. All I could think about is how my mother changed a man’s life who was incarcerated in a federal prison. It was one of the best examples and lesson in life about how your actions can change a person’s life for the better. It was a lesson in how small the world is. It was a lesson in how much I did not know about my mom. I couldn’t get the image of his face beaming with true joy out of my head.
