This story is about a school bus sliding sideways on ice in Sutton, MA. This happened to me when I was a kid. We had a massive ice storm and the lawns and streets froze in our neighborhood. We skated on the yard. Second day, we were skating and our school bus came sliding down the street almost sideways. We went to Roeper City & Country, a private school – which didn’t cancel. Over what I thought were really well reasoned objections by me – like it’s dangerous! – our mother made us go*. We slid through the neighborhood, almost crashing several times. The main roads were clear. One pickup was off the main road: Howard and Laurie’s house. They lived in between two little hills. We slid down the one and partly up the next and that was the end of the bus ride. We spent the next several hours locked in their basement because Barbara, their mom, didn’t want a horde of kids upstairs. Thanks mom! (As an aside, their dad was one of my dad’s best friends. I really liked Joel, except he would drive 95 mph through traffic while talking animatedly. He would send my dad British newspapers with porn stuffed inside. My dad said it was a joke but I don’t know.) I was also in a bus crash. 2nd row. Looked up, saw the garage getting really big, and the driver cursing because the brakes failed and bang I’m on the floor with my brother’s foot in my face. It’s fascinating how stuff happen sort of slowly and then really fast.
*She was very lazy as a parent. Huge step up from the way her mother was to her, but really lazy.
jomi: playing with perception 