Alumni

And so another quarterly meeting of the dreaded “Alumni,” retired members of Amalgamated Transit Union Local 282, my old bus-union at Regional Transit Service, drifts slowly into the filmy past.
Readers of this here blog, assuming there are actually any, will know that I also still attend the regular monthly business meeting of my bus-union, even though my employ at Transit ended long ago with my stroke.
As a retiree I am unable to vote on union business, so my attendance is little more than support for my union, which it needs considering how uninvolved and distant the membership is.
What few attend the regular monthly union meeting, and they are lucky to get a quorum, which is only 15, are mostly hires since I retired, so I only know a few.
My badge was 1763; I’ve seen badges as high as 2800.
About the only ones that recognize me are the Union officials, who go back before me.
The “Alumni” are people I worked with, so I know most.
There’s “W-D” Johnson and Lymus Blanding. W-D was the one who long ago convinced me to buy a van (our E250), and now I am on our third.
The meeting was held in a slightly dinghy restaurant across from the Greater Rochester International Airport, directly under the final approach to the north-south runway, the runway in use north-to-south.
We were given an anteroom, but every once in a while a jet would fly over about 100 feet above the building on final approach, trembling everything.
Memories of contract-negotiations years ago, held at the Airport Holiday Inn, directly under the final approach to the east-west runway, which could accommodate jets back then, but now they don’t use it often (except for general aviation), since it’s short.
Those negotiations were dreadfully boring. The only interesting action was those jets flying over.
I remember everyone chuckling once. Someone made a comment about “the real world,” which negotiations weren’t.
Not much seemed to be happening. Stony faces trying to extract free coffee from a dysfunctional coffee carafe.
I wrote up the whole turgid affair in my “282-News;” a slam-dunk pillory.
“May I have your attention please?” bellowed the Alumni Recording-Secretary over the din.
“The meeting will come to order,” bellowed Steward Broadhurst, Alumni-prez, offhandedly pounding his table.
“We are pleased today,” said the Recording-Secretary; “to welcome Ms. Kimberly Johnston of the local Diabetes Association to give a presentation on diabetes.”
“This should be sweet,” said Gary Colvin, a fellow retired bus-driver.
“Oh Colvin, will you shut up!” I said. “That was sick.”
Sadly, beside Colvin, I think I was the onliest one that got it.
No one else seemed to have noticed.
“Diabetes mainly effects African-Americans, Native-Americans, Hispanics, and people of color; more so than the average white person.”
“Honkies,” I was tempted to say; but didn’t.
Sadly, those in attendance segregated themselves into the usual groupings: blacks here, honkies there.
One guy was entertaining all-and-sundry. He used to drive Transit management crazy by saying “Yow-zuh” to everything.
I had a semi-related question. The Alumni have negotiated lower pricing with Q-Dental, but Q-Dental was billing me the regular price.
Question answered I buried myself in a Horseshoe-Curve book I had brought along, in case I wasn’t included in jawing.
Most depressing is Art Dana, my idol at Transit, the guy who determined my attitude toward bus-driving: just go-with-flow. The rules are a joke; just show up and they never fire ya. “The idea is to avoid getting shot.”
Dana has Parkinson’s, and his wife died. He’s also an old hot-rodder, and used to ride motorbike. He also had a large American-Flyer layout.
It’s good to see Dana is still around — he can’t be much older than me — but depressing.
He looks like a hobbled little old man.

“Dreaded” because all my siblings are anti-union.

For 16&1/2 years (1977-1993) I drove transit bus for Regional Transit Service, the transit-bus operator in Rochester, N.Y. My stroke October 26, 1993 ended that.

RE: “What few attend the regular monthly union meeting, and they are lucky to get a quorum, which is only 15......” —Our union has a membership of over 600.

“Badge” is employee-number.

During my final year at Transit I did a voluntary union newsletter called the “282-News” that caused weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth among Transit management. It was great fun; and I did it with Microsoft Word — although it required a lot of time.

Horseshoe Curve , west of Altoona, Pennsylvania, is by far the BEST railfan spot I have ever been to. Horseshoe Curve is a national historic site. It was a trick used by the Pennsylvania Railroad to get over the Allegheny mountains without steep grades. Horseshoe Curve was opened in 1854, and is still in use. (I am a railfan, and have been since I was a child.)

In the late ‘40s and early ‘50s, “American-Flyer” was a marketer of tinplate model trains. Unlike Lionel, they used two-rail track, so looked more realistic. Lionel used three-rail.