heroes and villains

Today I was on the bus with my favourite driver. He's an older man with a pleasant face, and he always has a smile for me. He usually drives me home after school is over in the morning. I think of him as Grant, because he drives the bus down Grant Ave, but I highly doubt that's his name. In fact, it would be a strange coincidence. I really hope that's his name. Anyway, for anyone who has been on Chorale at Bethany, he kind of reminds me of Les Wills, our English bus driver from Tour 2004, only less polite (I mean, really, who's as polite as Les?).
Anyway, I was riding along on my way home when the bus stops and a man gets on. Enter our villain. He was wearing skin-tight black jeans and some kind of belt with a huge, embellished buckle, a puffy black jacket, an old baseball cap and tan cowboy boots (that were actually rather slippery, much to my satisfaction).
He started asking the bus driver a question about transfers or something, and suddenly a huge fight erupted between them. Skin-tight Jeans Man started yelling at him, reaming him out, saying that he wasn't listening. The bus driver kept trying to explain himself, but the man wouldn't let him speak. He just kept saying over and over that the bus driver was giving him attitude and blah blah blah. The bus driver couldn't get a word in edgewise to explain himself. He even raised his voice a couple times, but our villain in the jeans kept cutting him off.
I observed all of this from my seat close to the front of the bus, feeling very uncomfortable. First of all, I was pretty disgusted with the passenger for antagonizing the driver, and I was scared that the bus driver would have to kick him off for verbal abuse, and that he would get really mad. I was also really embarrassed for both of them. For Skin-tight Jeans Man, because with his attitude, there probably isn't a soul that takes him seriously, and he is incredibly immature (immature enough to keep making rude comments about the driver after he was sitting, to try to prove himself a big man by pushing the driver around and making stupid comments like, "Do I want a transfer? Oh, I'm taking a transfer!"). And I was embarrassed for the driver, because when somebody yells at you, it makes you feel small, whether you want it to or not.
When I got off the bus, I stopped and thanked him nicely for the ride, as I usually do, but I paused for a second. The driver looked at me and said of our villain, "Waste of flesh, that one." He said it with a smile, but there was a sort of sadness in his eye, like he was tired and, while not defeated, ashamed of being brought so low. I said, "I'm sorry about that. It was awful." And I got off the bus.
Fighting really makes me nervous. I think I've heard too much of it in my life. Nothing is accomplished by yelling. Nothing is every accomplished by making yourself higher than someone else, especially in public, whether you know them or not. I feel sad that people don't feel good enough about themselves that they have to constantly step on other people to prove themselves.
If you're reading this, and you are one of those people that constantly needs to feel higher than the people around you, please understand that you are wonderful the way you are, and that it doesn't matter how people see you. Its the age-old church phrase of "It's what's inside that counts", but I'm serious. We're all the same in God's eyes: me, Skin-tight Jeans Man, the quiet girl in class, the old woman in the grocery store, the bratty thirteen year-old boy.
There is no hero in this story. The bus driver insulted the man after he left. He needed to feel validated that he was better than the villain. We all do it all the time. The slow server at the restaurant, the employer who didn't hire us, the person who doesn't drive according to our specific standards. They are immediately stupid and incompetent in our minds. But really they are people. Just like me. Just like us.
It's something to think about.