What does waxing a bus and extracting bodily fluids have in common?

Amazingly enough, neither is a euphonism. I know I know, totally not my style.

Well, if you looked them up on Urban Dictionary, I am sure they mean some horrible thing or physical act that may or may not be possible and is most likely a myth.  However, if you are a first-year Jammer in Training, it means only one thing:  You are a School Bus driver.

So training today was studying for your CDL, studying for any endorsements, taking the CDL test,  and drug testing.  And guess what? If you have a CDL you get to:

Or the highlight of the day.

You see, a school bus driver has all of the CDL stuff you need to be a Jammer. We even effectively manage children, which is actually on par with most tourist adults. At the same time, drug restrictions are pretty much a given with our public-facing profession of transporting the hearts and minds of tomorrow. So passing the yellow test with golden colors is hardly an issue.

So when they told us to start waxing a Jammer, I thought they were kidding. Then the cans of wax and rags came out, and the next thing I know here we are in a multi-million dollar purpose-built Jammer shop hand waxing a 1936 White Model 706 touring bus. You’d think there would be some kind of automation for this twice-a-season job.

The other day a couple of us got to take one of the newer refurbished buses from the shop back to LMD. That 7.3 Ford V8 purrs like a kitten. Good thing there were three of us.

Between figuring out which turns to make, finding the gas cap, to unlocking all the little locked boxes that hide all the things you need to pre-trip and log the miles, it turned into a team job.

And hey, we only rolled up over one sidewalk on Hwy 2 (good thing they have a heavy truck alignment machine in the Jammer Shop). Nice to spend a little quality time with future East Side Jammers Frank and Al.

There is nothing better than being a first-time Jammer with guys who are 10 to 15 years older than me. But at least they smile and seem like they can have a good time with this job. Like a school bus is 30% driving and 70% student management, this job is 20% driving and 1000% showmanship. All the world’s a stage and we are mere actors. Or circus lion tamers.

I also got my attire for the summer. I went with the zip-up tie because I hate to do a half-Windsor. I later found out these are the same ties the female Jammers normally opt for. So now I’m known as the guy wearing the ‘girl’ tie. They issued me the 1920s Newsboy cap, which has more the feel of a Chicago Prohibition gangster when worn by an old guy like me.

I’ll probably just buy the Outback Tilly hat. Just to stop my ears from burning and to have an excuse to work a horrible Austrian accent into my narrative. After all, how can you talk about Glacier National Park without sounding like you are from England’s largest penal colony?

Time to get in more hiking. Training is great, but something John Muir once said keeps echoing in the back of my mind.