Never much into buses or into snow stucks, but our school bus began going down into a steep valley somewhere around 1947 which was a very bad Winter. I was only six. Usually I sat over the rear driving wheels because there it didn't sway about so much. The sensation of spinning wheels n=beneath me was overtaken by anxiety that we might not get up the hill. I remember the driver making several attempts at it. Eventually he tipped us all out. The attraction, though, was the driver, Stan. He was a short guy in dark serge jacket and trousers, driver's cap with a shiny peak framing his classic square-jaw face, and a pair of black rubber wellington boots turned down slightly at the tops revealing the pale canvass interiors, trousers stuffed into the tops and blousing out over them. I remember him hanging out of the driver's door watching his wheels spinning whilst he hit the pedals with his wellingtons. I was filled with awe, riveted by the sight, which I rehearsed time and time again when eventually I found out what it was all about.
