In Canada we are very fussy about our personal space. If a stranger or someone not well known or trusted enters within two feet or so, it is going to feel invasive. Six inches and it's a violation. This doesn't always square with the every day reality of coping in public. Those of us who are not so spoiled as to take for granted the privilege of driving a car usually get around by public transit, which is often crowded to the point of being at times very uncomfortable. Imagine having to squeeze into a seat with a stranger, your bodies actually touching and sometimes having to endure this unwanted and enforced intimacy for half an hour or longer. Ewww! Doesn't that just creep you out, Gentle Reader? And please get that smile off your smug little face you obnoxious car owner, you!
Some people actually hate this kind of closeness. Some will insist on standing rather than share a seat with a stranger. Some are simply particular about their seat mates: no one old, fat, smelly, mentally ill, or wearing funny clothes. There are those who will not blush about reinforcing the boundary: they sit on the edge of the seat, making it difficult for others to cross over their rigidly positioned legs to reach the window side. There are those, often the same people, who rest their purse, bags, backpacks or whatever on the vacant seat to further discourage interlopers. Even I have done this before, but only under rather restricted circumstances: there is someone particularly obnoxious, badly behaved or potentially aggressive coming on the bus, for example. Generally though, as soon as the bus begins to fill up, I take my knapsack and shopping bags off the empty seat and, no matter how uncomfortable, pile everything on my lap so some grateful stranger won't have to stand on the bus.
On the other hand there are those who will openly oppose having to share a bus seat: the old woman who wouldn't make room for the Asian man dragging a huge plastic bag full of empty cans and bottles. He got very angry and began to spout and fume about how selfish English people are. I tried, not very successfully to calm him, others got a bit abusive and (I suspect) covertly racist. There was also the young man who was so upset about me sitting next to him that I changed my seat just to shut him up. When someone else sat beside him he started yelling again and this time chose to stand. Then there was the spoiled rich kid university student who tried to transform a double seat into his private office. I motioned to him to please remove his pack and paperwork from the seat so I could sit there. He could still type on his laptop, for all I cared. He got shrill and hostile, ordered me to sit in one of the vacant front seats (for seniors and disabled and I, being neither, didn't feel entitled to take up one of those seats). I said I was sitting down anyway. He squealed like a little girl for the bus driver to intervene and please remove this horrible bum from his prissy privileged presence (sorry about the alliteration, GR!). The driver likely ignored him and I'm sure didn't want him to see that he was laughing. The spoiled little rich boy finally got up in a huff, grabbed his things and took up two or three seniors' seats himself. Other passengers congratulated me for standing my ground with the snot nosed little brat.
Today I found myself sharing a seat with an obese young woman. It wasn't bad at first. Contrary to my fears she did not squeeze me against the window. Then she got out her phone and began to text, her arm and elbow resting on and obstructing my arm. I felt distinctly uncomfortable but didn't want to say anything, fearing that she would only assume that I was discriminating against her for being fat. I was still decidedly uncomfortable, so I adjusted myself on the street and tried to gently flip her arm off of me. She resisted, so I did it again. This time she muttered, "Oh God!" and removed herself promptly. When I was getting off the bus, oh if those eyes could kill!
I still think I handled the situation in the best possible way, knowing that saying anything to her likely would have resulted in conflict and perhaps getting sworn at. There is wisdom in the saying: "Never wrestle with a pig: you'll both get dirty and, besides, the pig enjoys it."
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