You are hot.

The equatorial sun is beating down, merciless, the humidity is about 1000%, and every part of your body is drenched in sweat, snaking down your back and legs and face in rivulets.  You¡¯re in a crowd of people – loud, tense, packed close together like a tin can filled with sweaty, smelly Vienna sausages of humanity.

Suddenly, in front of you – maybe only three feet away, but seven or eight bodies deep – something changes. A door opens. AND THEY¡¯RE OFF.

Rapidly the crowd surges forward – pressing, pushing, straining, pawing, grasping, grabbing, pulling, yelling chaos, and you¡¯re thrown forward on the tide, and to keep it from casting you aside you must become part of it – leaning into the melee, past the others who would oust you from your merited glory, battling for a space between the wildly flailing bodies around you, and lo! Behold, a door jamb!  You grasp it like your very life depends on it, ignoring the pinching and smashing as bodies bash against your hand, grinding it into the metal door frame.  You grit your teeth. You hold on. You WILL make it!

You use your newfound purchase to lever yourself through the scrum, bracing yourself against them with your other arm.  You step up – you¡¯re hanging on for your life, pushed out, but still clinging tenaciously, still squeezed forward by the people behind you, like herds of frightened cattle in a constricted mob at the gate.

One last pull, one more leg up, one more surge forward and you¡¯re IN!!! Pinned like a sardine, contorted like an acrobat, trying desperately to protect your purse and your vital organs, but YOU DID IT. YOU MADE IT. YOU RODE THE WAVE. YOU MASTERED THE TIDE. YOUR TRIUMPH IS TOTAL.

YOU¡¯RE ON THE BUS.

Sweat trickles over your forehead, meanders down the bridge of your nose, and drips off.