So I’m two days off the antibiotics and I was feeling great. The past few hours, however, my throat started hurting and now I can barely swallow. After 10 days of penicillin I have no idea how I may be getting sick again, but this is frustrating.

I’m disgusted.

Took the bus in this morning; it’s a mess and raining…already I’m pining for another bike ride into work like yesterday. Anyway. I’m on the bus with the usuals–the headphones on securely getting lost in my own little world for the duration of the ride.

Cannibal Ox is interrupted by voices getting louder and louder just behind me. I’m almost to the back of the bus. A woman’s voice, a man’s voice. The rise of vocal goes steep; people in front of me are starting to crane their necks back to see what is going on. The woman next to me wedges a thumb in her book, turns her head and gives a tsk muttering “It’s too early in the morning for this mess.”

So a woman and a man are arguing. Both are regulars on my morning commute. I cannot see them, but I recognize the woman’s voice. The woman is sitting next to her friend, who has a little boy. Age three, four at most. He is starting to cry because obviously the arguing is kind of frightening. Even for me. I mean, the whole thing reminded me too much of growing up, all the arguing…I could feel my stomach starting to knot up from the stress of just listening to it. I remember being that kid. I remember yelling please stop it to the deaf ears of adults hellbent on saying their peace loud and clear and don’tyouforgetit. There’s no helpless quite like that; it is a certain kind of fear and panic.

They stop yelling, and the little boy is still crying, and the entire bus feels awkward now. The man involved in the argument moves on to the front of the bus, getting close to his stop. As I said, he is a regular, and he has a learning disability. The woman at the back of the bus keeps calling him retard. I spin the volume down on my music, way way down and my shoulders start to shake. I want to turn around and tell her what for but I don’t. I just sit there with tears in my eyes, shaking, listening to her and her friend laugh at the man getting off the bus. I just….I can’t fathom people sometimes. I can’t believe that I kept myself from turning around and letting go. There had already been unnecessary confrontation on the bus at that point–even though I wanted to let that lady have it, I could not find a validation in that action, if I so chose it. Not at that point. There would be no regret, if I had said something…but my anger could not even be expelled. I could feel it popping all over within me.

I haven’t heard yelling like that in a while. I guess I forgot about how much it upsets me. That’s one part of it. Both parties involved are equally guilty for being so confrontational–I’m not saying that having a learning disability excludes anyone from that part of the situation. But still that woman…hurling such horrific words from the back of the bus to the man standing near the bus driver…that’s the other part. I couldn’t handle it.

This morning I have an awful taste in my mouth and I’m sitting at my desk, mentally kneading out the knots in the gut, shaking my head on a nonstop basis–why are people like this? I hold my hope in humans up to the light, devestated at some holes that will not stop developing.