In this section, I will address seats on the bus.
1. There are different seat types on every bus! Some are fuzzy cloth covered, others are smooth plastic. These seat types are significant in how great your ride will be. Smooth plastic seats and stomp-on-break-to-stop drivers are the worst combination for comfortable ridership, as smooth seats cause you to slide around, whether you like it or not. The only way to combat the slide, is to grip your feet to the floor with each start and stop, and/or grip a pole or seat back bar with your hand or arm. Think passive exercise! All that grabbing and bracing can be quite exhausting, so pace yourself! Most drivers I’ve had are stomp-on-the-break type drivers and that means I’m sliding forward a lot, or gripping my feet to the floor to keep from moving a lot.
2. Cloth covered seats are more germ filled, but they are softer to the derriere. Best scenario is to not touch them. And us health conscience types don’t want to touch any part of the bus anyway, because of germs passing from person to person via the poles, back of seats, the cloth covers, the doors, and the like. Oh my, so many germs to think about! The situation is not as dire as I am portraying it. A person can just as easily get ill sitting all day in the same room with a sick person at work or home, than from the bus germs. However, it’s a good idea to wash your hands when you get home, or use a hand cleaner while en route, nonetheless.
3. Where to sit is also important, whether you have the choice of a window seat or the aisle seat. I prefer the window seat, if I can get it. It affords more options, be they watching out the window at scenery and not being knocked by passing patrons looking for a seat. You can do more thinking or pondering while looking out the window and more easily imagine you are not in a bus at all! A downside of the window seat is feeling trapped. If claustrophobia is an issue for you, sitting in a bench seat paralleling the length of the bus can be more comfortable. In the winter, when everyone is wearing bulky coats, a negative of being on the aisle is being knocked on the arm or hand by other patrons on their way to a seat, either by their body or their baggage. It’s an accidental incident, I presume, but when sitting on the aisle, it can feel as if there’s a target on your arm that says, “Hit me”. Usually, when others are entering the bus, I lean in toward my anonymous bus buddy so I won’t get knocked into. Then, once everyone is seated, I move back to an upright position.
4. Speaking of the bench seats in the front of the bus and the back, the ones in the front are reserved for the elderly, those in wheelchairs or with walkers, or people with strollers and kids. I try to avoid the front seats, unless there’s no other seat available. If I do end up at the front bench, I invariably watch to see who is boarding and assess if they fit in one of the aforementioned categories. If so, I will hop up and move to the rear, giving the new rider a place to land. There’s bench seats at the back of the bus, too, if you prefer them. In the back, people are more inclined to give their backpack it’s own seat, so you may need to be assertive to get your own seat.
I think I’ve exhausted the seat topic, and now feel like sitting down. Stay tuned for Part 3 next week!