Drivers! Start! Your! Engines!

I have three words that would make any self respecting 7th+ grader quiver: Back to school. First off, you're being sent back into the hell of the academic system again, for another 180 days of you life. Did you know that you spend the equivalent of 6 years of your life in grades 1-12?Plus all the time and money spent towards college. Second, you've got to get used to all new teachers, classrooms and schedules. And then there's the school bus. I've had my share of bus drivers. I've had angry drivers, one who was always late, and then a substitute I swear had lead feet. Then there's my sister's bus driver.

My current bus driver is funny as hell, friendly, and the radio station he listens to has a great morning show (not that it can beat Preston and Steve on MMR). Only one problem. Roy is always late. My bus is supposed to pick me up at 7:00 in the morning. Often times I'm waiting until 7:10. A) Its morning, which I don't cope with well, B) He's late. I have people to see and things to do in the morning. C) Just wait 'til it starts raining or snowing, or the damn wind is blowing with avengeance. If you're a bus driver, please have the decency to pick your kids up on time.

The substitute bus driver, whom we'll call "Rhonda" for lack of a better name, from last year was...scary. School buses do NOT equate to stock cars or street racers. They're not made for that kind of stress. And residential streets aren't for quick speed ups and then slamming on the breaks 5 feet before a stop sign, turn or speed bump. Apparently, none of this information phased Rhonda. Man, she would go barreling down the street the WHAM! hit the breaks and almost caught air off the speed bump. Whiplash, much?

My sister "Marie" is in elementary school, so one would expect the bus drivers to be a little more safety rigourous. However, Marie's driver "Laura" is just fucking obnoxious. Every single stop, Laura uses the intercom to say "Wait. Look both ways! Alright." and then, when the kid is crossing the street: "No running!". Look woman. I've been waiting here for 10 minutes, if not more because you always manage to run late because you spend 5 minutes every stop directing the kids over the intercom, sometimes in the wind/rain/snow, and you're wasting even more of my time? There aren't any cars in the intersection, nor are any coming. Let the damn kid cross! I want to go home! It's lovely that you're teaching the kids to be safe, but do you really need to use the intercom every single day? Teach them on the bus, and keep your trap shut once the kid steps off the bus.

Don't drive away Laura, I'm not done with you. I was out walking the dogs, heading away from my house. I legitimately have somewhere to go, someone to meet, and what do I see coming down the street? That's right. Marie's bus. I was crossing the street, headed even farther from home, by the time Laura pulls up to the stop sign. What does she do? She lets Marie off the bus. Why the hell would you do that? I know that Laura knows what direction we live in, because she sees walking home everyday, seeing as she drives past in the same direction. I was headed the OPPOSITE direction of home, yet this woman lets a young child off four blocks before her usual stop. According to Marie, Laura said something along the lines of "Well, she's here, so you may as well get off here." FUCK NO! I'm standing on the corner, confused and outraged, not moving. By pulling that stunt, Laura wasted 20 minutes of my time, walking Marie home and continuing with my walk. [Next time she tries to drop Marie off in the middle of my walk, I'm making Marie get back on the bus.]

Bus drivers are great and all, and they have a lot of responsibilities. But, for the love of all the ways I could potentially make your life a living hell, save the safety talks for on the bus, be on time, and most importantly, DON'T BE STUPID!

Beauty and The Beast

What truly is beauty? Do we define it from the dictionary? Or has beauty become something twisted and false? Is beauty a creation of Hollywood, unrealistic preconceptions and stereotypes [see Stereotypes and Styling]? What is natural beauty?

By dictionary definition, beauty is "1: the quality or aggregate [the total collection] of qualities in a person or thing that gives pleasure to the senses or pleasurablility exalts the mind or spirit. 2: a beautiful person or thing; esp. a beautiful woman." Definition one is good, but then you get to number two. Do I sense a bias and opinion, in the dictionary of all places?

Hollywood is full of glamour and glitz and the broadcasting industry has its well-known stars and models. Women have small waists, are nicely endowed up top, and long shapely legs. And if not, they can always get augmentative surgery or use computer generated images that favorable body features. While I know there is an industry for plus size models (kudos to Dove for their Campaign for Real Beauty and the Self Esteem Fund), it's never at the forefront, and we're constantly bombarded by pictures of skinny yet voluptuous women. How is it that this became the standard [see The Totem Pole]? Women have body shapes of all sorts: hourglass, top-heavy, bottom-heavy, long- and short-torsoed, long legs, short legs, thick and thin.. By keeping expectations at a rarely attainable level, we others suffer from a lack of self-esteem, disdainful looks, or are ignored by the male population that hold these lies to be self-evident.

Even men have stereotypes. I have to admit that, yes, I will go weak-kneed at the sight of abs, a strong back and a set of good arms, but realistically, all I want is someone who is proud of who they are. Not a body builder.

Once you get past aesthetics, you really do have to look at whats on the inside.Would you be friends with someone who has no sense of humour? Or if they do, an excessively vulgar sense of humour? What about respect, respect for you, themselves, and others? I once dated a guy who turned out to be a pushy, idiotic ass. Which brings up the point of smarts. Some people are so insipid and/or air-headed that I want to take them by the collar and shake them until they have whiplash. Others are too smart, and then become condescending. But when a gal or guy has smarts and knows how to use them, its beautiful. Having brains is a delicate balance between common sense and academia.

When someone says "natural beauty", what do you think? A girl with no/minimal makeup on? Or the stars gleaming in the night sky, the moon shining with silver light?

With people, natural beauty is what is there with minimal enhancement. Eyes that shine with humour and enthusiasm. The way someone carries themselves can allude to their self-confidence, or lack thereof, and approachability. Are you going to be more willing to talk to someone with a closed, cold face, arms folded and leaning against a wall, or someone who stands straight and smiles, even if they don't know you?

What I'm getting at is that beauty isn't just aesthetics. It's a matter of everything about a person coming together in relative harmony, with a favourable personality and even some quirks. You can't be a copy of a model and expect that people think you are beautiful. I know plenty of people who could try out for modeling, yet they are not beautiful. On the other hand, I know people who may have some weight to lose, or perhaps not the most pleasing of features, or not-so-great physiognomy by "standard" definition, that I think are beautiful because of who they are as a whole.

Going back to the second half of my natural beauty question: Natural beauty as nature makes it. The stars in a cloudless night sky, the sunset or rise as seen from an uncorrupted shoreline, chicks hatching from their eggs, peeping and stumbling into life, and watching the wind create ripples in meadow grasses in the hummocks between hills. These are astonishingly beautiful moments the we encounter. But how many of us take the time to actually look? The raw, real beauty of the landscape is awe-inspiring, and unfortunately quickly becoming a diminishing luxury. Once we lose this beauty, it will be gone. And then all we'll have to look at are models that represent approximately 5-10% of the population.

What can be taken away from this? That beauty is not just skin deep, it permeates everything and everyone. Step back and allow your paradigms to change. If you take the time to see the world from a different perspective, you may be in for a pleasant surprise.