Today I am going to try to simplify.  A short story will be told and you can make your own conclusions for judgements.

Saturday morning I went to take the bus.  Well, ran because the bus was adhering more to the schedule than usual.  However I made it before the bus zoomed off, so all was peachy.

Three stops a later, a man with a bicycle tried to get on.  In our region, the bike holders are located on a metal rack on the front bumper of the bus.  The bikes must stand up straight and be held down by metal bars.

I did not look too closely, but my guess is that the tires of the bike were too big to nestle comfortably in the curved well provided.

Again, I would assume that it was a BMX big tire or simply a wide tire.  But for several minutes, I felt a thumping on the front end of the bus while the bike owner tried to get the bike to sit lower.  It would not fit.

The bus driver got off and the two of them MacGyvered what seemed like a workable solution.

At the next stop, the driver told the bike owner that it was falling out of its spot (which might result in the bus running over it, an accident, and hurt feelings all around).  The bike owner got out, tried once again to get the bike to fit, and then got back on.

The bus driver stopped again at the next stop.  The handlebar of the bike was angled at such a degree that the bike was interfering with the bus’s windshield wiper.  The bus driver and bike owner both got off and did their best for several minutes to get the bike to cooperate with the bus’s gear.

At this point, a woman walked from the back of the bus, poked her head out the door, and stated, “We are all going to be late waiting for you”.

The bus driver was quick to reply, “We are only two minutes behind schedule, ma’am.”

Eventually, the bus driver left the biker behind.  One assumes that he ended up biking to work.  Not many options were available to him at six o’clock on a Saturday morning.

A few stops later, another man on the bus had something to say.  He walked up to the bus driver.  He leaned over to make sure the driver could hear him and stated something along the lines of, “That was very kind of you to spend so much time and effort trying to help that guy.  Much props to you.”

The driver replied by nodding and going back to his route.

I am attempting to keep my dang mouth shut.  Derive what lessons you will.  Clearly though, I feel there were two very different reactions to the exact same incident.