Riding the Bus

We took the bus to school today for registration. As I expected, going out there is easy. The bus stops a block from our house between 6-10 minutes after the hour and then stops half an hour later three one block from his school. He should get there 10-15 minutes before first bell. No problem.

Coming home is going to be tight. Fortunately for him, his very last class is right next to the back door. If he leaves promptly and walks at a fairly normal pace, he should get to the stop at the earliest moment the bus should arrive. Most days he will have to wait five or ten minutes. He is going to try it on foot at first. I'm not sure how much time a bicycle would save. He could do the 6 blocks in less than 6 or 7 minutes, but he would have to go around to the front of the school, run into friends, and mess with a bike lock. All in all, I'm not sure he would gain time.

I'm nervous because the window between school and bus is so close. As long as he is not late and the bus is not early (and how often is the bus early?) it will be okay. We have options, of course. I can ask his drama teacher (last class) if he can leave school just a few minutes early. We can see if he can save time riding his bike. I plan on giving him a ride if there is ice or if it is raining heavily. Roland and I figure that it will take about one gallon of gas to drive out and get him, so if he just misses the bus and doesn't want to wait for the next one, we will charge him whatever the going rate is on a gallon of gas.

If all fails I can also eat humble pie and ask to get back into the car pool. I've been having some conversations with another car pool mom about the bus. She wrote me this morning that she was "not opposed in principle but had reservations." She then told me what her reservations were. I wrote to her again after we did our experiment, addressed some of her concerns, and told her we decided to use the bus and she should let me know if she wanted to put her kid on the bus too. I'm pretty sure she thought I was going to do what I did last year: try to convince the car pool group to use the bus. This year we are just dropping out of the car pool.

I just can't tell you how much I want this to work out. It should. I am concerned about that tight afternoon window. It could be though that the schedule is perfect. If he had time to chat with friends and then stroll to the stop he would be more likely to get distracted and be late. Since he knows he has to book it, he will just go.

And having a bus pass will mean that he can sometimes go home with the new friends that he is making. All he needs is for their parents to agree to take him to the main drag to catch one of the buses home. The last bus gets close to our house at 7:45pm.

Have I mentioned recently that I really, really want this to work?