Everyone gets their kicks in different ways. For , a writer for the Christian Science Monitor, it seems that riding a bus through Los Angeles is her idea of a good time. Hey, far be it from me to criticize anyone’s love for pubic transportation. I dig riding the subways in New York, even though I’ve never intentionally gotten on one to take me to, say, the Bronx with the idea of merely riding there and back. Well, that’s not exactly what happens here. There are some issues having to do with getting change and a sweet, but stubborn bus driver and the Getty. All these things figure in to the small story here of a woman seeing her home town for the first time in a while.
I confess along these lines that I was surprised my the following line: Although I had studied Spanish for four years in elementary school – required more in honor of the area’s Hispanic past than in anticipation of today’s immigration – I was surprised at how many businesses now had Hispanic names. We passed mueblerías, plomerías, taquerías, and supermercados.
Now, as someone who grew up in LA as well, let me just say Ms. Lehmann-Barclay’s surprise to find signs in Spanish is rather odd and my guess is she either lived in the richest, most sheltered community in town or in the 1950s. But whatever. The piece is short and satisfying in its own way, and as this native Los Angeleno forgives the writer her minor trespasses.