Sweet Miss Alice

I had the joy of having my favorite regular passenger tonight. If I ever finally get off my ass and find other employment she would be one of the few people I would miss. Her name is Alice, and she's possibly the nicest, sweetest old lady I've ever met. She's hard of hearing so I, being Mumbles McMumbleson, have to repeat a lot of what I say. She gets picked up after her dialysis appointment and is driven to her daughter's house in Scarborough. Back when she paid for her rides she would give $26-27 for a trip that costs $23 and change. Now she's a client/customer/beneficiary of the Regional Transportation Program, meaning RTP now pays for her ride via a charge account, so now it's $23.50 or $19.98 after the fleet owner takes his cut. Despite this, she's still my favorite.

Alice is also the nosiest person I know, though she calls it "being curious." She asks lots and lots of questions about my life, which I would normally find off-putting, but for some reason I spill my guts to the old bird and tell her everything (though I censor it sometimes to spare her conservative Christian ears). Her mind is like a steel trap, recalling almost everything I say. She remembers my parents live in South Carolina and my sisters are in Queens. She kept asking about how filming for Damnationland was coming along, and about the premiere, and if I ever wanted to do more acting. Alice would inquire about my friend that I was more than friends with for a spell and her child.

And tonight was no exception. It was the first time I had picked Alice up in over a month save for the time a few weeks ago, but I had a lame-o trainee with me and we couldn't really rap (which we were both bummed about). She forgot my name (the woman is in her eighties), but after that everything else came back to her, that elephantine memory of hers. I told her about something that had been weighing a bit heavily on my mind, an issue, for various reasons, I feel I really can't talk about to anyone I know. So she listened. Just by confiding in her I felt better. But she gave me some advice and made it seem not so bad. I look forward to our next time together.