Another ten minuter, is that a word?


What Happens on the Bus

Now see, when I try to talk about what happens on the bus, people always assume I’m talking Greyhound or Trailways. Sort of an earthbound equivalent of a really cheap discount airplane.

I’m in a Howard Johnson’s coffee shop in LA at three am trying to unwind after the concert and the guy next to me at the counter overhears my conversation with the waitress about packing the bus. I was so burnt out from this tour I couldn’t help goofing on him.

“Well, all the important stuff goes in the trucks but there’s a list of what has to be on the bus every night,” I say.

I think the guy was a trucker who’d done a few too many whites because he totally misunderstood what I was saying.

“I can’t believe you have to unpack that thing at every stop. What a pain,” he says to me.
“Oh it’s not too bad. I just pull everything out of the luggage compartment onto the concrete; set aside what’s gotta stay and throw the rest back in. It’s hard on the back though.”

“You have to drive and do all that unloading and loading too?”

I say, “Sometimes I can get one of the passengers to help me out.” I’m trying hard not to crack up. I don’t tell him that Eric likes to drive sometimes. We’re not supposed to mention the headliner’s name in public.

Anyway, I’m way past the notion that driving a star around the country on tour makes all of us grunt roadies stars too.

The trucker slurps his coffee, stands up vibrating in his need to get back on the road. He slaps some bills on the counter and me on the back. “Hang in there, Dude,” he says.

“Oh yeah, I will.” I smile at the waitress and finish my OJ. I could’a told him so much more but am happy I didn’t.

After all, what happens on the bus – stays on the bus.