When it comes to Christmas time, I think we all windup thinking of “Christmas Pasts.” But as those of you who know me can testify, my “Christmas Pasts” have given me a lot of fodder for stories of “When things go wrong.” Of course, I have many such stories. One of many, it seems, starts in December 1954.

The Christmas of 1954 found me in the Navy, on a little manmade island — tons of mud had been dredged up out of San Francisco Bay to make an island to host the 1936 world fair, so they said. Later seaplanes and dirigibles made use of it but eventually the Navy took it over and constructed a Navy electronics school there. And that’s where I was at. My new home and it was Christmastime.

The Navy closed the school during Christmas and strongly urged us to take Christmas leave. I decided to go home to Stonewall. I mean: Christmas is Christmas. For our convenience, the Navy set up kiosks staffed by railway lines, bus companies and the airlines. Didn’t take long for me to decide that flying was too expensive, and the connections were poor. And I found out the railroads had given little thought as to how to get me to Stonewall. That left Greyhound and Trailways bus lines for me. I went to Greyhound’s counter and found they were sort of like the railroad. You had to go through L.A. to get home. While still negotiating I noticed the Trailways agent, motioning for me to come over. I did. He said I would save about $7.00 and instead of going through L A. they had a direct bus to Barstow, hooking me right up with their fastmoving Express bus to Oklahoma City. Wow! Save about 8 hours. I picked them. I felt pretty smart about my deal.

The big day finally arrived, and I went over to the bus station in downtown San Francisco and found my bus. It was full; standing room only. The driver assured us we would be put on a bigger bus soon that was roomier. He was half right. We were soon unloaded into a Safeway store parking lot. Not a bus station. It was cold and foggy. We all huddled there in the parking lot like a bunch of condemned Jews in WWII. Shivering. Finally, our second bus came roaring in. It too was small, old and overcrowded but away we went. I was sitting in the floor of the dark bus, close to a woman and a fussy baby and a 3-year-old girl.

It was something like a bad dream, there in the dark, but the dear lady holding the baby said, “Sir, if you would hold my little girl, I’ll let you sit up here. So, I did. It was late and Barstow was still far away. The little girl and I soon fell asleep on that miserable bus from Hell.

Later, I woke up and quickly realized that my little girlfriend had wet all over me. But I just sat there. We finally pulled into Barstow the next morning. It was cold there too. I splurged on a rundown looking taxicab with an odd-looking driver and found a store where I bought myself a pair of jeans, a shirt and underwear. My seat sharing lady allowed me to treat her and her little family to breakfast in the busstop there in Barstow. About two hours later the big express bus rattled its way in. It was an overcrowded wornout piece of junk, but we all got on anyway. Back on the floor I went. I was getting homesick for Treasure Island and rethinking my choice of Trailways over Greyhound.

All went well for a while. The floor was uncomfortable but at least we were eastbound on I-40. Then the bus pulled over to the side of the road. Our driver invited us to get off if we wished. “I am out of gas,” he said. We got off and practiced our rock throwing in the barren desert. I wondered how a transcontinental bus driver could forget to gas up. A few passengers deserted and hitched their way on to the east. But I stayed. One old Army guy was offering odds of 3 to 1 we would never see a driver again. My lady with the baby and little girl sat on a big rock crying. I was worried but the driver did finally return with a six gallon can of gas. We proceeded to a gas station and refueled. We proceeded on and troubles stuck to us like bubblegum. A rear tire blew out. It took hours for a service to come out and fix it. It was very late when we got to Albuquerque. By now I had repossessed my bag and spotted a charter busload of sailors on a greyhound charter headed to Oklahoma City. I sneaked aboard and made a speedy and easy journey the rest of the way to Oklahoma City on this, a clean, new fast Greyhound. Goodbye Trailways.

Wow! I thought. Who knew? Yes, I finally boarded a Jordan Bus out of OKC to Stonewall and had hardly gotten home before I began to wonder. How do I ever get back? I did. But that’s another sorry story. And was my Christmas merry? Well, that’s another story too as I sometimes wonder what ever happened to the poor young mama with the baby and her smelly little girl I last saw in Albuquerque.

Hope your Christmas is great and remember the reason for the season as you make it to church next Sunday. And avoid riding on Trailway Bus.

Wayne Bullard, DPh

cwaynebullard@gmail. com