A few days a week I commute to Oakland. As the crow flies, It’s about ten or twelve miles. But crows can fly across the Bay. I cannot. Those ten or twelve miles (13 by car) take half an hour to drive and about an hour by public transportation. I take public transportation – which involves a bus ride into downtown San Francisco and a train ride under the Bay. The buses can be crowded. The train can be wacky and full of characters. I suppose the bus has its share of characters as well, but because it gets crowded, they’re less noticeable. I haven’t done this commute often enough for it to become automatic. Nor have I done it often enough for me to do anything other than half zone out, half pay attention to everything that’s going on. On flights, they’ve started calling this behavior (just sitting there doing nothing – no music, no movies, just staring ahead or out the window) raw dogging. I’ve been raw dogging flights long before it had such a dumb, and most likely influencer-coined, name. I do the same thing on my commute in and out of Oakland. Listen and observe and stare off into space.
The other morning, as I was blissfully watching the people get on and get off the bus and as I watched the city streets awaken, my phone buzzed with whatever nonsense was going on in the group chat I’m in. For the most part, I ignored the buzzing. I thought – it’s kind of nice to just zone out. Not that this is anything new for me. I’ve spent much of the past year zoned out and watching the world go by, mostly on park benches by bodies of water. At this point, I’m kind of a pro at zoning out and observing.
Almost immediately after my moment of appreciation for the simple act of sitting and watching, I was reminded of an disagreement (because argument feel like to strong of a word) I had years ago with a woman I was dating. I couldn’t remember the precipitating cause of the kerfuffle, but I know it had something to do with our different communication styles as it related to texting, timeliness, and frequency. Then (considerably less so now), I was the type of texter who responded quickly and expected the same in return. She was not that type of a texter. Sometimes, she forgot her phone when she went on walks, or left it in the other room, or maybe just ignored it. As someone who responded quickly, I didn’t understand how this was possible. After all, it was me who was on the other end waiting for a response, and I mean, who isn’t glued to their phone waiting to hear from me? (hints of sarcasm, there).
The part of the quarrel that stands out was when she said something along the lines of, “I don’t want to talk to you all the time” or maybe it was, “sometimes I don’t feel like responding to you.” It was years ago and I don’t remember the exact phrasing, but I know I took it personally. With the use of the word you, it might have been intended personally. What I hadn’t considered, and where additional context might have helped, is that maybe it wasn’t me, but was instead the demands of the outside world (which happened to include me) that she had wanted to ignore. Maybe she was just zoned out and enjoying the ride. While I can’t say for certain that it would have helped, the context (explaining “I just like to zone out”) might have soothed my ego or at least given some nuance to what felt like a jab. We shook the teapot, a tempest formed. It was dumb. We were most likely talking past each other and taking unnecessarily obstinate stances. Most stances are unnecessarily obstinate.
Commuting to New York in 2006 was the last time my commute involved a long train ride – one in which I could read or sleep or zone out. Ever since then (with the exception of my brief stint in Memphis), I’ve had to drive to work. Traffic, stop lights, gas break, gas break, yell at jerk who cut me off. I seldom have moments of zen when I’m driving. For me, Zen moments tend to come when my attention is free to wander as opposed to be yanked in various directions by the pressing distractions of modern life..
So there, on the bus a few days ago, as I ignored the buzzing of my phone, I was reminded of how we can sometimes find peace in the middle of a crowded bus. And as I was typing a note on my phone during my commute, I was also reminded of how little space we’re afforded on a crowded bus. Sometimes writing or texting or staring at my phone feels like I have no privacy. In that regard, it can be easier, and more preferable, to ignore the phone and stare out the window. As I thought about these things, I appreciated (and lamented) the squishy truth that only through experience can we glimpse into (and understand) how other people live, struggle, or find peace… through experience we learn grace and begin to recognizing that the world doesn’t revolve around us. Perhaps had my experience at the time of the squabble been one of taking the bus on a regular basis, I might have had a better understanding of the girlfriend not wanting to text on her commute. Thankfully, if we’re open to it, experience can make us softer, put a little padding around our understanding of the world, and teach us not to take things so personally.