"Just Tap It!" (or The Thrilling, Swirling, Infinitely Alive Space between Atoms)

So the first time we rode the MARTA (Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority) public bus that runs down the main street right by our neighborhood (once we walk a third of a mile straight uphill, by the way), we used cash to pay the $1.75 fare. I asked for a transfer and was told, "You can't get a transfer when you pay with cash."

Okay, odd.

"How do I get a transfer?" I asked.

"You have to use a Breeze card," the driver replied.

"Where do I get a Breeze card?" I asked.

"You have to go to the train station."

"But I'm riding the bus. I'm not going to the train station."

A shrug of the shoulders, as if to say, if this were New York, "Whaddya' gonna' do?"

So, several day later, we go to the train station and we buy the Breeze cards (you need separate ones for each person, even for the cards with a limited number of trips on them). Ten trips for $17.50 plus five dollars for the plastic card, which you can then reload. Not exactly a deal, huh? (There are other options as well, including a $13 unlimited-trip 7-day card). But each trip allows two free transfers, so you can go from the bus to the train to a bus, and you can literally blow open the map of Atlanta and suddenly get to many, many places.

So the bus comes and we get on and it's one of our bus driver friends (we've made friends with several of them, and they honk when they see us bike riding each day) and we proudly show our Breeze cards. The bus driver smiles broadly. I look for the place for us to swipe the cards, but there is none.

"What do we do?" I ask.

"Just tap it!" the bus driver exclaims, motioning toward the metal box in front of her.

"Tap it?"

"Tap it!"

Sure enough, I take the card and "just tap it," and bingo, it registers. My daughter does the same and we trot on back to our seats, the results of all the errands we ran overflowing in a bag I'm carrying.

And then we see it, the shopping cart a seasoned MARTA rider drags on to the bus with her.

And I want it. I sit there looking at it, coveting it, imagining how much easier that shopping cart would make my new semi-pedestrian/public transportation-rich life. And, ultimately, I realize what I'm actually doing is figuring it out. Figuring out how to ride this system. How to get where I need to go (or change where I'm going to accommodate where the bus and train actually go). And how to transport items when I'm traveling on foot in the heat of summer in Atlanta, GA. And I realize my view of the world, of my world, is once again changing.

In just a week or two, here is what we have experienced:

* A bus stop so surrounded by weeds that something scurried when we walked over to it.

* Bus stops overflowing with garbage and unprotected from the rain and the sun

* A bus stop that dropped us at a very busy corner across the street from a shopping center--with no crosswalks at all

* Sidewalks that simply end and dump us into busy parking lots with no pedestrian accommodations

* Consistently empty buses running through my town all day long while endless lanes of cars spew pollution everywhere we look

Forget all the articles and theory--these urban planning and transportation problems become clear as day when faced with them.

We've also experienced:

* The incredibly joyful feeling of sitting on a comfortable bus and gazing out the window, our minds wandering, our conversation stimulated by things we never noticed before

* Connections to some amazingly nice bus drivers that make us feel more completely part of the network of our community

* The pleasure of making new memories and, for me, reliving the memories of all the buses I've ridden in all the cities in which I've lived and visited, mostly that bus I used to ride up 3rd Avenue in New York City every morning to go to work. I had forgotten how much I loved starting my day each morning on that bus.

Interestingly, in the quiet moments of my day, I find myself piecing together the puzzle of MARTA routes in my head. I call my mother and say things like, "If I leave my house on my bike, catch the bus and load my bike onto it (there is a place to load then on the front of the bus), take the bus to the train station, catch this other bus, ride it up to the corner of this and that, and then ride my bike two miles down that street, I can get all the way to your house!"

Silence. (Sorry, Mom! I know I exhaust you sometimes.)

I read something the other day in Ode magazine's excellent issue about silence that keeps resounding in my mind (ever so paradoxically). Turns out that according to quantum physics, the spaces between atoms are filled with vital energy. And I think I'm realizing that the spaces between destinations are filled with vital energy, too. And that these spaces, between here and there, are opportunities to feel alive, if we embrace them. To connect. To experience. To know that we are making a difference. To celebrate the vital energy in our communities, and, in doing so, to enhance it even more.

And so, this MARTA thing, I realize, is yet another step on the journey for me. And when I "just tap it" with my Breeze card from now on, it is as if I am tapping into the thrilling, swirling, infinitely alive space between atoms.

"Just Tap It!" (or The Thrilling, Swirling, Infinitely Alive Space between Atoms)