Bus stop

I got to the bus stop and sat on the bench. There was a tiny wizened old man already there. My Ipod had died on the way over and with nothing else to do I struck up a conversation.

"Been waiting long?" I asked.

"All my life," he responded.

"Huh?"

"My entire life has been made up of waiting. Waiting to be old enough for school. Waiting for my first kiss. My first job. My first child. The bus. Every aspect is some waiting. At my age, you start to wonder how much of your life is spent waiting around instead of doing. It's a lot."

"I guess I never thought of it like that."

"No, no one ever does until it's really too late to do anything about it. Like me. I certainly never gave a hoot about the future until it was already here and it was too late to change. Now my time is almost up and all I've got left is waiting for the bus and waiting to die."

"Hey now, you're in pretty good shape..." I protested. "You'll probably live another ten years, at least."

He sighed. "You're probably right. But why would I want to? I've already been put into a home by my kids. My wife is dead. The future in front of me now is long and unchanging. In ten years everything will be exactly the same at best or much much worse. Why would I want to live like that?"

"It can't be all bad," I protested feebly, letting him continue. I could feel the urgency behind his words. He had to tell somebody, but nobody was listening. Except me.

"I'm just waiting for death now. You know the worst part about being old? It's not losing friends and loved ones. That's hard of course. It's not remembering youth and vitality. It's remembering everything that's happened to you throughout the course of your life. it weighs on you, gnaws at you. Your memory becomes so heavy, so bloated with facts and faces and places you can hardly stand it. Remembering everything you've left behind. That is the worst."

I opened my mouth to say something but just then the bus arrived. The old man got on and just before I did I changed my mind and decided to walk instead. It wasn't too far and it was a beautiful day. As the bus pulled away, i caught a glimpse of the old man. I smiled at him and raised my hand. After a moment he smiled back.