So I'm driving home from lunch, taking a detour, a direct line to the car wash to put another layer of wax on my Jeep. I cross this really bad intersection and in my joy of more life I see ahead of me a school bus, with its red lights flashing ... and I realize it is a little past three. No worries, I have my life, and I have my Jeep, so I just turn up the car-fi, and glory in the total driving supremacy of a Wrangler.

Allman Brothers play on the radio. We drive on together. The long chassis F150 rolls its chrome bumper slowly as the big yellow bus blocks any view ahead. We share each stop. The stern Asian mother on my right greeting her 8 year old boy ... the barely clothed blonde on my left greeting an apparent (must be a second wife) ... the father in the grey pickup, waiting out of sight in the driveway three houses up ... then a good looking woman, in a blue tshirt and jean shorts, brown hair in a pony tail, glasses, walking out as the bus stops right in front of her house. As the red flashers blink, the mother is casual and cool, and now standing in her driveway, is smiling. She looks behind her, and as I do, there, behind her, the front door opens ... and out zooms a blonde little girl, maybe five years old, in a sweet pink and yellow dress, almost formal, down past her ankles as she runs past her Mom with a smile on her face. The appears from the school bus and it is a young boy, the older brother. The little girl beams, increases speed, and as the boy steps on the driveway, she, now in her final approach, opens her arms WIDE! and hugs her newly home brother as beatrific joy radiates from the little sister's face. The brother - like any male - at first stiffens, but then her sister is so happy he just smiles, throws his books over his shoulder, and hugs her back.

I drive on. I will never look at "stuck behind the school bus" again in the same way. Life can be stunningly beautiful.

tgd