Hard Truths for the Practitioner of Public Transportation

This is not my bus.

Brothers and sisters, I have learned some hard truths in recent days. So gather up the kids; here comes wisdom.

1. Do not get on the wrong bus in the morning. Do not get on the wrong bus in the morning even if it is the bus that you take in the afternoon on the way home. Number 26 is not the same as number 27, even though your mind will tell you that it is.  Number 26 will take you the wrong way. You will then have to stand up and pull the "Request Stop" cord and explain why you need to get off before the first stop. All the other passengers will shield their faces in shame. You will proceed to run back to the transit center but you will still miss the bus you should have taken.
   
2. The schedule posted on the Metro website is somehow more accurate than the live GPS bus tracking app. If you give it the chance, the app will lie to you. It will tell you that your bus is over twenty minutes late when, in fact, it's right on schedule. This will cause you to say, "To hell with it," and begin to walk home instead. The bus, bloated with climate-controlled air, will then blast past you less than two blocks from the station you just left.
   
3. You should not walk home from the bus stop in the summer while wearing dress clothes. If you do, you will be reminded by nature that when it rains in Houston in June it doesn't "cool things down" or "take the edge off." Instead it makes the entire city feel like a 5k-running werewolf's ass-crack. You will curse the month of your birth.

All that said, I really can't complain. These things were my fault, really. The bus and the train have been pleasant up to this point and quite liberating to boot. In a city where the car is still by far the most popular way to get somewhere, its nice to actually turn away from one.

A Step Toward "For Real"

Today, Wednesday, June 3, 2015, I am quitting my full time job as an engineer to more fully pursue fiction writing. Granted, I'm replacing my full time engineering job with a 24 hour/week contract engineering job, but still, it's a fairly big deal to me. This new working arrangement will give me two more full days per week to write, edit, and work on marketing my fiction. I sure hope it catches on, especially with the upcoming full length novel.

Besides, here's the deal: I'm not particularly interested in being an engineer anymore. Yes, I went to school for a LONG time to get my degrees, and I've worked engineering jobs for six and a half years now . . . but I'm just not that into it anymore. I'm not sure I ever was, to be honest. I was good at it, I think, but it doesn't hold a candle to the mind-flaming satisfaction I get from writing fiction . . . not even close. It's like eating a rice cake versus eating a smoking slice of deep dish pizza. There's just no comparison. Writing is something I look forward to waking up for. Cubicle farming and staring at math is not.

It's true that college and all the engineering stuff has gotten me to where I am now, and it's allowing me to have this opportunity, so I'm not knocking it. It pays the bills, for sure. Fiction writing doesn't . . . at least not yet. The world needs engineers, I realize. Lot's of them. So kids, go be engineers and scientists and doctors and technologists, because we need you. Maybe I'm being selfish thinking I can be more useful to society as a writer.

But you know what? (Perhaps this rhetorical question and following answer is an effort to convince myself that I'm not crazy/self-centered in what I'm doing). The world also needs writers. We need good, thoughtful writers that can leave a continuing legacy of human imagination. I hope - badly hope - to become one of those writers. It's my calling; I'm convinced - as convinced as I have been of nearly anything else. Maybe it's true that I suck at it now. Maybe I'll always suck at it. Only you, the reader, can tell me. (I have a nagging feeling that I don't suck, though, and that's part of what's pushing me.) Regardless, what I'm certain of is that I simply have to pursue it to the limits of my ability. I cannot look back on my life and regret having not gone after it. In the end it may not take off, but then again, it very well could. It's a bit of a gamble, but isn't everything that's worthwhile?

Now a bit of clichéd advice for those of you who like taking advice from sources that may or may not know anything at all: Do not pass up a chance at doing something you love, even if you are convinced that it probably won't work. It is only by trying that you will find out.