It was a weird day.
This afternoon I'm riding on the 42 bus out Walnut Street to A.'s house to borrow their car. I'm talking on the phone to my ex from college, S., when a bicyclist riding next to the bus is run down by the car behind him. I watch the whole thing happen, right outside my window. It looked like the car ate the bicycle's back wheel, folded it up and gulped it into its mouth, located under the hood. Then the rider fell as the bike seemed to collapse under him, and he disappeared under the front of the car, too. I was going, "Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit," over and over. I thought I had just watched someone die. Others on the bus were yelling, too, and the driver stopped. We looked back, and the guy was sitting up on the ground, seemingly shaken up but okay.
Finishing my conversation with S., who is studying Buddhism, she was making a point about not being very accomplished at it yet.
"I'm not the buddha," she said.
"Hmmm," I said, "If you're the buddha ..."
"If you're buddhist ... and you know it ..."
"If you're buddhist and you know it, clap your hands." She laughed. Pause. "No," I said, "if you're buddhist and you know it, clap one hand."
She laughed for five minutes.
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