i have a list of little phobias. one of them is driving. i hate it.  i would rather not. i feel panicked behind the wheel. i see those other cars in my mirrors and i’m sure they’re chasing me or trying to run me off the road or nudge me or bump me. i have vivid daymears of things falling off trucks and crashing through my windshield, of the car spinning out of control and slamming me into a concrete barrier, of my breaks giving out and me honking my way down the interstate completely out of control.

what does this have to do with cleveland?

glad you asked. to finish up my graduate degree i took the city bus downtown to cleveland state twice a week.

i waited on euclid avenue for bus number 6. not only was i the only twenty-something woman on the bus. i was the only white face. i grew up in suburban littleton, colorado, and this was my first experience as the minority. i used to pull my hat down further over my face, trying to pretend i was the same color as everyone else. i buried myself in a book. i looked out the window. i avoided acknowledging that nearly every person on the bus was staring at me.

i wish i could say that by the end of the semester i was more comfortable taking bus 6 into town, but i wasn’t. i never got used to that feeling. to that edgy strangeness of not being like everyone else. it’s something everyone should have to feel one time or another.