And other things that smell like urine

It’s 9:30 and I’m waiting at the San Jose Caltrain station until 10:30 p.m. for the next train. And I realize how much I miss my car. You would think that growing up with a father who is a bus driver I would have a little bit more appreciation for mass transit. When I was a little girl I always looked forward to take-your-daughter-to-work-days. I would swing on the bars and run up and down the aisles for hours. The passengers would tell me stories and then my dad would take me out to get an ice cream before we went home.

Now I get out of school around 8:30p.m. catch the 9:00 bus that gets me to the train station two minutes to late to catch the 9:10 train so instead I wait for another hour to catch the last train of the night at 10:30. The other riders are no longer smiling at me and telling me stories; instead everyone avoids eye contact and composes their faces in a carefully blank expression. All I want to do is get home and now I won’t be there till well after 11.

These last few days have killed the joy of public transport for me. It used to be so nice to ride the train into the city knowing I wouldn’t have to worry about parking. But now I will remember this boring night where there are only three other people in the station and they are talking in Spanish so I can’t listen in.

And I’m not so sure that Menlo Park feels like home. I’m not sure what it is but there is something missing there. I like the apartment but, I don’t know, it’s just not the same as Santa Barbara. I feel more connected with San Jose but that’s just because I spend all of my time there. I’m sure that after a few months I’ll like it better.

But I don’t know how long I’ll be there either. I’ve kind of gotten itchy feet, which I know A wont appreciate, although I’ve always had them I’ve just hidden them since I’ve been with A. After school I think I’d like to move to New York and live there for a few years but again A wont go for that. But that’s where all the magazines are. True a writer can write anywhere but to work on a magazine you have to be where that magazine is, very few people can survive off a freelance budget.

Oh the urine thing, mainly that was just the bus on the way over to Caltrain, how does a whole bus smell like pee?