Listening

 Yesterday I went to lunch with one of my favorite people, Bob.  We sat and talked about how easy we have it in America and about all the places in the world that are oppressed by their governments and don't enjoy the liberty that we have.  He was telling me about the shortage of women in China and how there's a group of people who smuggle women out of North Korea and sell them to Chinese men.  Crazy. 

Bob is full of stories.  I could sit and listen to them for hours on end, for he surely has enough of them to talk for days.  He talked about how he used to live out west and worked in a logging camp.  One winter there wasn't much work so Bob decided he was going to drive bus for the school.  Well there was one kid on the bus who thought he was all that and was a bully of sorts.  He was misbehaving one day and Bob was so fed up that he threatened to throw the kid off the bus.  The kid didn't believe him and kept yakking his mouth so Bob pulled over the bus, walked to the back, picked up this kid and carried him to the front of the bus where he proceeded to open the door and throw him off.  In the dead of winter.  I think his last words to the boy were "make sure you stay out from under the wheels when I leave". 

Bob is one of the most gentle people I know, but he doesn't always play by the rules.  I think his philosophy is "rules are for people who can't make their own rules."  He almost got sued and they threatened to arrest him, but he simply shrugged his shoulders and said, "the kid wouldn't listen, what was I supposed to do?" Bob said the children were so well behaved from there on out.  He said he remembers the expression on the children's faces when he threw the kid off the bus and drove away. Wide-eyed and open mouthed.  I laughed.  He would be in A LOT of trouble if he did that these days.  But then again, it seems like discipline is pretty much labeled abuse in this day in age...

Anyways, I love to just listen. I love taking in stories and trying to imagine what it was like to be there as a story unfolded.   I didn't say much as he told me stories yesterday, for there wasn't much to say, but I did daydream. A lot. His stories are always so rich because they always seem to go against the grain of normality.  He's not afraid to do something that someone says you shouldn't do. He just does it.  And it makes for some entertaining storytelling.

Bob and his stories. Keep 'em coming, Bob.  I'm listening.