A few weekends ago, I discovered that I am most certainly at the center of a government conspiracy. I also bought a bag of clothes for $10.
The commonality between these two life changing events was RIPTA bus 78, bound for Pawtucket and the aforementioned $10 bag of clothes. (You heard that right—stuff a paper bag with all the second hand turtlenecks you can get your frugal little hands on for a flat rate of ten dollars. Shut up and take my money because I can afford that).
My friend and I, both incredibly emotionally overcome when we heard about this rare opportunity, thus set out to the Thayer Street tunnel to wait for the bus, which eventually guzzled to a stop in all its exhaust spewing glory. Poised with my ID, I boarded, ready to swipe my card, awkwardly collapse into the nearest available seat, avoid looking at anyone else, and worry that I’m going to miss my stop for the duration of the trip. This is my modus operandi for public transportation because I am from the suburbs.
As I was acknowledging the bus driver with the unintelligible greeting that results from deliberating too long between “hi,” “hello,” and “how are you?” (think: “hi-o you?”), the card reader spat back an embarrassing, electronic signal of rejection and proclaimed the peculiar statement—BAD LIST. I looked up at the driver for an explanation. He just shook his head and stared at me like the college aged idiot I am. I tried again. BAD LIST.
“Next time, I’m gonna have to make you pay! Next time I see ya!” He threatened ominously. I tried to ask what exactly this BAD LIST was and why I, an innocent girl who respects transportation regulations and most other laws, was on it. He continued scowling so I muttered “sorry” five times and scurried to the back of the bus in shame and confusion. With a television screen steadily circulating through multiple advertisements for case studies on teenage e-cig users and pregnant women, I was lulled into a state of comfortable paranoia, my imagination running wild as I tried to decide what BAD LIST meant. I dreamt up the following scenarios:
- The CIA put me on a watch list because I had the X Files theme song as my ring tone when I was fourteen.
- That, plus the fact that I occasionally read conspiracy theory websites for hours on end, which is admittedly suspicious.
- I’m actually a criminal. Somehow, I’ve been living a double life that I don’t know about. In a sleepwalking haze, I roam the streets of Providence in a black trench coat, kicking over trashcans and trading spare car parts on the black market. I’m also an accomplished, somnambulating hacker who infiltrated the NSA database, not to steal information, but to pollute it with memes. Still, they’re afraid.
- BAD LIST is an acronym for an organization of vigilante crime fighters who wear reflective sunglasses and are all inexplicably good at mixed martial arts. My parents are members. The bus driver is too. I’m about to receive my first mission. It could be coming at any moment.
- I am the chosen one. This is the beginning of a sci-fi thriller trilogy where I save the world from the takeover of artificial intelligence, or an evil scientist who wants to infect the U.S. with a flesh eating virus, or a one eyed billionaire living on a submarine with a secret vendetta against me. I will start seeing the phrase ‘BAD LIST’ everywhere—on cashier registers, written in graffiti, spelled out in my alphabet soup—until an attractive but stoic young man saves me from a group of thuggish men with face tattoos who have infiltrated my Classics class, strapping me to the back of his motorcycle and delivering me to an underground bunker. He is my love interest. The movie grosses 63 million dollars and has a Rotten Tomato score of 25% because it has too many action-thriller clichés and an unconvincing protagonist.
- It’s Santa Claus. He sees me when I’m sleeping. He knows when I’m awake. He knows when I ride the bus, so he hacked into the card reading system to scare me straight. Right now, he’s laughing with cookie crumbs in his beard, stroking the ukulele I would have received come next December. That goddamn jolly jerk.
It’s safe to say that my inner monologue spiraled even more from there, but then we arrived at the shopping center and I packed away all my delusions, attributing them to the suspicion I get every so often that I’m starring in my own version of the Truman Show. I decided to stop being narcissistic and start hoarding sweaters.
Fifteen dollars later*, it was time to take the bus back. Would I be put on the BAD LIST again, or could my prior experience have been a practical joke that the bus driver routinely plays when he sees vulnerable college girls babbling about consignment shopping?**
It was the BAD LIST. I tried to get more information from the driver, who just shook his head, scolded me vaguely, and agreed that I should go to my school’s card office. So I did, but with discretion, just in case the Brown Card Office proved to be a front. Perhaps this BAD LIST nonsense was devised to lead me to a contact on the fifth floor of J Walter Wilson, where my true mission would begin.
It didn’t play out that way exactly. I approached the man at the desk and made sure to explicitly mention the BAD LIST with dramatic emphasis. He just smiled, said he’d take care of me and gave me a new ID. Unless I overlooked a secret code word or hand gesture, this seemed fairly standard. But maybe, this new ID will open a door to the headquarters of a covert resistance force. Maybe the government needed my old ID to collect data on me. Maybe I’m just a lunatic who’s overly invested in the National Treasure franchise.***
No matter. I will continue to be vigilant. So if you’re reading this—government agents, or secret society, or Mr. Claus—I’m on to you. I’ll be wearing one of the eight sweaters I got in my $10 bag. And I will be ready.
*I bought a pair of shoes for $5 because I am weak.
**This was my friend’s hypothesis because she has a whimsical view of the world and has never watched the X Files, least of all had the theme song as her ring tone.
***To clarify: I am definitely not. That would be embarrassing.
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