Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS writer.
I used to drive trucks. It was kinda boring. Mile after mile of endless roads, never stopping, well only for fuel, food and toilet breaks. One day a mate said “come drive buses” and I was hooked. No need to load this freight and I had some company while I drove. It was outback Queensland in the early 90’s and miners lived on the coast and worked 250 klms inland. So I drove them to work in my bus out along gravel roads through the brigalow scrub. The afternoon shift, underground miners. The toughest men I’ve ever met. Tougher than the truckies I shared the road with, although many more truckies died than miners. The miners all seemed to die in big lots in huge explosions. The truckies seemed to always die alone in fiery wrecks plunging over lonely canyons.
Nothing I saw or did in that wild west time ever prepared me for driving in Melbourne. Driving late night buses in a town that got all its weather from either the desert, Antarctica or Adelaide. It’s a big wide flat city with roads that change names every few kilometres and no noticeable natural landmarks like the east coast cities.
One day some smart bugger had a smart idea to make a thing called a smart bus and had it run a big orbit around all the multi cultural tasselled fringe suburbs of outer Melbourne. During the day time it is a slow but popular way to get around. Convenient is a word I hear a lot.
Once the sun goes down the service becomes free. Not because it’s free but because nobody pays. Fare evasion is the norm and the seats begin to fill with the people of the night. WADWALs or White Angry Drunks Without A Licence are usually the most feared. They are the most likely to physically attack a driver. Those people you see on Police TV shows who lose their licences. Yeah, were stuck with them now. Another group equally feared are the sub-18 teens. The night buses are their sport. The drivers are targets, sitting ducks. With little support, no back up, alone at the wheel weaving through the local playgrounds of these gangs of bored teens. They are as big as grown men but with the brains of young boys.
Attacks are frequent and bus companies are either old school ignorant and uncaring or new school touchy feely to the point of cartoonish empathy, OHS that is an arse covering exercise and cliched safety posters. Employers spectacularly unskilled at helping traumatised drivers. It helps to hire steering wheel attendants who are crazy to begin with. Those on the edge, to drive around the edge. Bottles, bricks, rocks, stones, paint, eggs, fruit. Every missile, every insult, they come flying into our faces. Spit, punches, ninja kicks, busted windows and doors.
Why the hell do I do this job? Am I “just asking for it?” Every night at work for me is reclaim the night. When a woman hops on my bus late at night and they see a woman driver, I can often see a look of relief as we greet each other. I think I make her feel safe in an unsafe space. I think I can make a difference. Women need to feel safe and respected wherever they go. This still does not happen. This is why I am here.