I Am On A Bus Ride

I was on a bus ride to school one morning looking out the window admiring the view of the sun rise over the city thinking about what our class assignments were going to be for the day. My train of thought was then interrupted by an obnoxious radio jokey yelling “And now, Changes!” When the song came our bus driver Mr. Tim jolted and turned the volume up high, it was obvious he loved the song. The beat had a piano playing throughout it and had a male vocalist singing the chorus. During the verse an emcee was rapping about war, poverty and the struggles of living in the ghetto with an angry but concerning tone in his voice, I was mesmerized by his words.
As the song continued, it was as if I could see everything that he said, from the wars in the Middle East to police brutality here in our own country. It was impressive how someone who felt so deeply about these real life circumstance and events could express himself through music, I was inspired. I was about eleven or twelve years old and it was the first time a song had such a profound impact on me. When the song was over I was hoping the radio jockey would announce the name of the artist but, he didn’t it went to commercial. I asked my friend Alex, who was sitting in the seats across from me if he knew who the artist was to the last song we just heard. He had a surprising expression on his face and then raised his voice and said “that’s Tupac Shaker, as if I was supposed to know who he was.
At school I thought about the