Bitter

I get a little bitter on the cold days. 

I see women, and men, prancing around in their usual garb, with maybe a thin coat or an ornamental scarf.  "If you stood outside for 3 minutes" I think "You'd freeze.  Clearly you do not ride the bus!"

I get a little bitter because, I, of course, do ride public transit.  I'm the woman dressed "like a homeless" in layers because I can spend up to an hour in that God-awful windchill, freezing.  I even carry a wool blanket in a tote bag in case things get really bad. 

I didn't used to be so careful, but last December I was drenched as a cold front arrived.  Then I had to wait outside in the weather - probably 20 with a windchill, wearing nothing but a fleece coat and wet jeans. 

I can see why they wet people and expose them to the cold, as torture.  It was horrific. 

Amazingly, we didn't get sick. 

Today, I wore my workboots with wool socks, long underwear under jeans, long underwear top under a pocket t-shirt, a fleece jacket, and a knit hat.  Of course I wore the usual undergarments.  I carried 2 blankets (one for each), extra hats, and gloves in a tote bag. 

I was warm, and glad I did it; but my attire screamed "I spend a lot of time outside" as ladies pranced by in their see-through ponches and decorative scarves.  The men threw a medium weight jacket over their clothes, and called it done. 

I was embarrased, I felt my attire screamed "carless loser". 

People don't know.  They don't know my birth mother drank a fifth of hard liquor every day she was pregnant, messing up my brain for life.  They don't realize I can't drive any more than they can fly a spaceship. 

They don't know the trials of public transit, waiting for hours, riding next to someone wearing too much cologne (often the driver), or stuffed in the back with 2 other obese people, gasping for air. 

Most of them wouldn't care.