One of the biggest perks of being a school bus driver is the time off. It is the most significant selling point for me to remain in this job – we love our vacations.
Victoria Day weekend had come, and we decided to spend it in Akron and Mansfield, Ohio. On this trip, we saw some fantastic places and heard screaming children.
It was odd to visit Kingswood Center Gardens and hear a child screaming at the top of his lungs while we admired the mansion and beautiful grounds. We would walk from garden to garden, snap a picture of a flower, stop to listen to another scream and carry on.
We arrived at one of the last gardens when I pulled out my map. I mumbled to my wife that this place has peacocks, but where are they? I wondered if the Peacock Playhouse might be where they were hiding. I had ignored that location because it was a children’s playhouse, and I feared I might be too big to play.
A gentleman behind me heard my muttering and asked if we had heard the screaming child.
Yes, of course, it is hard to ignore.
That is the peacock, he continued. A second later, another scream reinforced what the man said.
We thanked him for his information and hurried towards the screams.
We found the noisy bird magnificently displaying its feathers. We snapped a few pictures and enjoyed the beauty of this ornate creature.
Days would go by; I daydreamed while driving a bus full of children about the vacation we had just returned from when a boy screamed, “HI!”
Everyone on the bus jumped at this unexpected sound.
I would praise the boy for his remarkable imitation of a peacock. Naturally, he was confused, so I explained that a peacock sounds like a screaming child.
He would scream “hi” again, and I would coach him on how he needed to shape the sound better to be more authentic to the sound. The ride home was noisy.
I now proudly say I have heard a peacock imitating a screaming child and a screaming child imitating a peacock.
The things I hear as a school bus driver.
