Bus Kids
posted August 11th, 2023 at 1:53 AM
So it's well after midnight on an East Van bus. Two kids, both in army jackets, one asleep, the other staring. The mother, young and beautiful with hoop earrings, staring into space. In eight stops I witnessed, she did not look at her kids once. Zero attention. I've been around parents and children so long to know this was not normal, and it wasn't drugs: it was something situational. I'll always wonder: what was going on in that family to make the mother so distanced that she paid no attention whatsoever to her children for so long.
9 Comments
Post a CommentThis feels like objectification and judgment.
Aug 11, 2023 at 9:57am
Maybe she was having a traumatic freeze response. Who knows and why is it your business?
Why
Aug 11, 2023 at 1:13pm
Does it matter that the mother was beautiful?
How do you know?
Aug 11, 2023 at 1:30pm
Maybe the woman wasn’t their mother. Maybe she’s their sister or something. Sure, she should have paid more attention, but try not to sit in judgment of people when you have no idea what’s happening in their lives.
Your brilliance astonds me
Aug 12, 2023 at 8:50am
Eight stops on public transit and you know all about their lives.
The only thing you're confessing is that for some reason these three people were pointing the way to understanding yourself but you lacked the courage to do so.
Observations are not confessions.
Anonymous
Aug 12, 2023 at 2:33pm
Exhaustion?
You don't know.
Aug 13, 2023 at 9:05am
Maybe she was giving them attention all day long and was taking a break on the bus, no harm done. If the kids were asking her for things and she didn't respond, that would be different.
Huh?
Aug 13, 2023 at 4:05pm
Because one of them was asleep and the other was sitting quietly and she was likely exhausted because parenting is exhausting.
Komn Sence
Aug 14, 2023 at 8:11am
Maybe she was tired.
Hm
Aug 15, 2023 at 12:22pm
It's well after midnight
I'm sure she was tired and wish she could have dozed off.
Join the Discussion