We all float down here..

Today, a stop after my transfer, an adult male with autism got on the bus. I wasn't sure at first, but it became evident after a few minutes. He repeatedly stroked the side of his chin as he got on the bus, took a seat, and hunched down and began talking softly to himself. The more people got on the bus, the louder he became, and the chin-stroking moved on to flapping. Right hand on his right knee, back of hand to palm, over and over. When he was loud enough that I could hear him, it was hard not to stare in surprise. It was the most fascinating case of echolalia that I've seen. He was clearly repeating conversations, but he was doing it with savant-level mimicry. His voice changed, the tone changed, the accent changed, and the language changed several times. I recognized Cantonese, Japanese, and Czech. The only thing that stayed the same was the tone of the conversations - they were all happy. Occasionally, when something he said was funny for him, he'd give a real laugh and not a mimicked one, and it was adorable. Some of the conversations were a bit salty with the language, but dude was clearly repeating happy conversations. It wasn't until the guy behind him made a phone call that I realized dude was repeating overheard phone calls - he repeated what the guy behind him said. "Hello, is this Robert?" "Hello, is this Robert?" "Oh, hey, is your name Robert too?" *headshake* He picked that guy because of the people around us on phones, that guy sounded happy.

A lady with two kids got on the bus. She was clearly already in a foul mood, snapping at her kids and swatting them to get them to move forward faster so they could get seats. She sat kitty corner from dude and clearly made him nervous with her aggressive tone toward her kids, because he began rocking and the flapping got worse, and he got louder.

"Shaw-NAY-uh! Girlfriend, you scandalous! You need to back up off that boy 'fore he gets with some other bitch won't trash him for some wannabe-rapper-whiteboy. *voice change* [Something in Japanese.] *voice change* No, man, I don't give a shit for any of that. No no no, I don't give a shit, really! It's ok, he can have the car. Yeah, it's ok. *voice change* It's going to be CHRISTMAS soon! I can't wait for snow! What? Yeah, we're going to go skiing.."

And then Bitchy McBitchpants took umbrage and yelled at him to shut up, that he was swearing, and I quote: "Can't you see there are some motherfucking kids on this here bus?? Watch your mouth, you crazy bastard!"

I turned to her and very calmly said, "Leave him alone. He's not hurting anyone."

She gave me a glare but shut up. It lasted about ten minutes, until we hit the downtown mall. It's all lit up for the holiday parade that happens every evening around 5. One of Bitchy's kids stood up to see out the window, peering at the lights and looking for the parade. She grabbed him and yanked him violently down into his seat and yelled at him. Dude got loud again, "Got my board and I'm gonna hit the park. *voice change* That homework? Brutal! But I aced it. Yeah, I'm sure! *voice change* [Something in Czech] *voice change* Did you get it?? I got it! It's going to be awesome! Shit, yeah, man!"

Bitchy went off on him, standing up and towering over him to scream at him. "DIN'T I TELL YOU TO QUIT YOUR FUCKING SWEARING AROUND MY KIDS?! ARE YOU FUCKING SLOW?! SHUT YOUR GODDAMN MOUTH UP!"

That's about how long it took me to get up and in her face and back her up off the dude.

Now, I'm a fairly irascible person - but there's a difference between when I am annoyed and when I am angry. You can tell by the amount of swearing - when I'm angry, the swearing stops and the Icy Glare of Death comes out. She was bigger than me in both height and girth. The woman tried to go all aggro Alpha bitch. Too bad for her I can do rabid aggro Alpha bitch without even raising my voice.

Me, calmly: "Shut up and sit down."
Bitchy: "YEAH?? WHAT YOU GONNA DO ABOUT IT?"
I stared at her, and I smiled, and apparently that conveyed just how close I was to giving her a painful life lesson.
She sat down.
Bitchy, sitting down and glaring at me: "What are you, the retard whisperer?"
Me: "Must be. I'm talking to you."
Bitchy, trying to regain footing: "Tell him to shut up, then!"
Me, calmly: "He's trying to stay calm, and that's his method. If you don't stop yelling at him, he's likely to lose his calm and, m'am? If you make that happen? You are going to want to get off this bus."
Bitchy: "He dangerous?"
Me, smiling: "I didn't mean because you'd be in danger from him."

She glared at me until she got off the bus, but she was mercifully silent the rest of the way. Dude was able to calm back down and go back to mutter-level talking.

She's very lucky I grew up with someone who had a processing disorder and learned at a very early age not to do anything aggressive that might send them on a meltdown. She's really, really lucky that her aggression didn't cause dude to have a meltdown. If she had caused that, I probably would have lost my shit on her, because her actions had put me in a total fury.

Been home over an hour. Still angry enough to spit brass tacks.

My tum demanded Oreos, so when I left work, I swung by the Kwik-E-Mart and purchased some, even though it made my soul shrivel and die a little bit to support a store that insists on a phonetic spelling.

Tearing open the pack, I began devouring my chocolatey cookie goodness, because the tum is to be obeyed at all times, lest I want it to punish me and send me to the ER for no valid reason. ¹ I was a block from the bus stop when I was accosted by an angry, elderly black man who proceeded to open his mouth and spew forth a tidalwave of crazy.

"What's that you eatin', girl? Oreos? You puttin' that chemical crap in your body? Don't you know it bad for you? It got lard in it! LAAARRRRD! Made from dead pigs! How you can eat that shit!? It's all just lard and sugar! Not even real sugar but that stuff made from corn. Corn shouldn't be no sweetener! How you gonna just walk along and eat that? Don't you know better? They use child labor. They's little kids in China or somewhere makin' those things for cents on the dollar! You're supporting child abuse! HOW CAN YOU DO THAT?! How can you eat those lard and sugar cookies when IT HURTS CHILDREN THE WAY IT DO?!"

Thankfully, after years of living with my half-sister², I speak fluent crazytalk. I listened as his angry, shouting voice echoed off the marble of the buildings around me, waited for him to take a breath, and calmly asked, "Would you like one?" I offered him the box. He drew himself up with extreme dignity and said calmly, "Yes, I would." He took a cookie, thanked me politely, and went on his way.

This shit only happens to me.

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¹ I have Acute Intermittent Porphyria. If I don't keep my blood glucose, carbs, potassium, and sodium above a certain level, I wind up with excruciating abdominal pain that has no apparent cause, but requires a hospital visit and a steady demerol drip to fix. The diet is a pretty sweet deal. The hospital visits are not, so I obey the tum when it says, "Bitch, feed me (sugar/salt/bread)!"

² My half-sister has bipolar disorder and is unmedicated. She's evil. I'm pretty sure she'd be evil even without the mental illness, but living with someone who flies into psychotic, frothing, screaming, physically abusive rages for the first 19 years of my life may have biased me against her.