CHICAGO—Archer Heights resident Kyle Tulane has cited “feeling unfulfilled living as a bus” in his decision last month to cease riding his green Huffy bicycle in circles at Pulaski Station. The move comes after a year of intense soul-searching and wraps up twelve years of dedicated effort.
“You know how it is when you’re younger, trying on different identities,” Tulane said. “For me, I thought maybe I could make it as a bus.”
“I’m sure it sounds silly now in hindsight,” he added.
It was on a warm day last July as the now-30-year-old was taking a break at Santiago’s Pizzeria that he first sensed a change was needed.
“It struck me that none of the other buses ever stopped in there for lunch,” he explained. “I started to wonder what kind of a bus I could really call myself.”
As summer turned to fall and then winter, more doubts plagued Tulane until soon he felt overwhelmed.
“It bothered me that after all these years, I had never taken a single passenger to a single destination,” he said. “Now I asked myself, ‘If you’re really meant for this life, why is it taking so long?”
Even others at the transit station noticed a shift.
“Something definitely weighed on his mind,” reflected Genevieve Lessewicz, 68, a retired baker from Garfield Ridge. “He hardly ever rang his bell anymore.”
“It’s difficult to watch from the outside when someone is struggling,” said one shirtless man with a Bowie knife.
The final straw came when Tulane realized that while other buses were equipped with windshield wipers and headlights at the front, he himself had only a basket to keep a small umbrella and a box of Mike and Ikes. “The Lord has a way of letting us know when he’s got different plans for us,” he mused.
For the past several weeks, that plan seems to have steered Tulane toward a new life of popping wheelies in a local Applebee’s parking lot.
“He’s a nice addition to our community,” said assistant manager John O’Rourke. “P.F. Chang’s just has a few shrubs with a family of squirrels outside.”
Despite Tulane’s excitement, the move hasn’t come without its moments of sadness. “I wave now when I see the other buses, but they never wave back,” he said. “I guess that’s how it goes when you make a big pivot.”
“All part of life’s journey,” the former bus concluded.