14D

I got into my first verbal altercation with a black kid on my morning bus commute!

Don't know what got into me, I mean I know I can be spazzy, bitch-y at times, but I'm usually passive when it comes to actual confrontation.

I was late for a meeting, and, as I boarded the bus, looked for a seat as I needed to read my meeting notes to prepare.

I reached the back of a very crowded bus, and saw that a punk-ass black kid was purposefully sprawled out on two seats. I asked him to scoot over and he just looked up and laughed at me.
Then shifted over slightly.

"Can you move a bit more." He glares up at me and doesn't budge an inch. At this point I had unconsciously decided that I was going to see this through, so I sit down anyway, cramming myself into the half-space.

I turn and stare at him, "This is a public bus, you have to share." He looks around, "I am the public." I stare back at him, "So am I."

He and his buddy start to laugh and point at me, cussing in some foreign tongue that I couldn't understand - ebonics I think they call it? I looked over every now and then and made eye contact with his buddy, who was apparently cursing obscenities at me.

I knew he was talking smack, so I tried the reverse psychology approach. "What, did you say something?", and smiling innocently. I was listening to my iPod, reading and ignoring them, but privately shaking as I pretended non-chalance.

Then my thoughts wandered to the recent shooting of a women by 'punk' teenagers on the lower east side. Maybe it was stupid to have picked a fight with a kid? All I wanted was to teach him some manners! God I'm getting old.

By the time we got to our stop, the whole thing seemed to have blow over. And now I am a true, angst-filled, morning commuter in New York.