Vroom! Vroom! Things that Go (Or Don’t)

Bob Gra­ham also wrote about an aban­doned bus in A Bus Called Heav­en. In fact, the sto­ry begins — before the title page — with one word. “Aban­doned.” And it goes on, “The bus appeared one morn­ing from a sea of traf­fic, right out­side Stella’s house, where no bus should be.” On the bus was a hand-paint­ed sign that said, “Heav­en.”

After the title page we learn “The bus brought change to Stella’s street. Traf­fic slowed where no traf­fic had slowed before. Peo­ple stopped and talked togeth­er, just a lit­tle but they talked. Stel­la changed, too. She took her thumb from her mouth where it usu­al­ly lived, and said, ‘Mom­my that old bus is as sad as a whale on a beach.’ Then she whis­pered, ‘It could be … ours.’”

That after­noon when Stella’s dad came home from work he found an old bus “where the front yard used to be.” He said, “’The wheels stick out onto the side­walk. There are sure to be reg­u­la­tions.’” But Stel­la had her own reg­u­la­tions and the bus stayed.

The bus set­tles in. Snails bur­row under the tires, spar­rows nest in the engine. Neigh­bors gath­er to clean up the bus while chil­dren play under it. They remove the garbage, wash and orga­nize. When neigh­bor­hood boys see an oppor­tu­ni­ty for graf­fi­ti, Stella’s moth­er tells them to come back dur­ing the day and they can paint the whole bus. And they do, copy­ing a pic­ture Stel­la draws for them. Peo­ple share their belong­ings with the bus — gold­fish, com­ic book col­lec­tions. Stel­la brings her table soc­cer (even though it only has one goalie). Soon the bus is a busy place. “Babies crawled. Peo­ple laughed. Kids fought. Grand­dads scratched dogs. Meet­ings were planned and the Fin­gles showed their vaca­tion pictures.”

Com­mu­ni­ty grows around the old, now fixed-up bus. But one day a tow truck arrives to haul the bus away. “It’s against reg­u­la­tions,” says the tow truck dri­ver. And he takes it to the junk­yard. “This one’s for the crush­er,” says the junk­yard boss.

Stel­la saves the day and the bus by sug­gest­ing a game of table soc­cer. The boss can even have the only goalie. If Stel­la wins the bus will be saved. “Why should I play table soc­cer with you?” asks the junk­yard boss. “Because there are spar­rows nest­ing in the engine,” Stel­la replies. Stel­la scores ten times — and wins! With Stel­la and her mom steer­ing, the neigh­bors push the bus out of the junk­yard and to a vacant lot behind Stella’s house. That night “Music drift­ed high over the city and the grass was danced flat around a bus called Heav­en. As a full moon rose, three snails slid safe­ly back under the tires. And tomor­row Stel­la will see the spar­row chicks fly for the first time.”

We should all have such a bus as this bus called Heav­en in our lives. And if we don’t have a bus, per­haps we can find a bench, or a table, or a shared pic­nic blan­ket, and dance the grass flat around it, cel­e­brat­ing togeth­er shar­ing and kind­ness and speak­ing our voices.