 They wore crazy t-shirts, sporting slogans and pictures, which shouted their individuality, personal beliefs, and desires.  Many wore skin tight jeans that spoke of their youthful prime.  Most seemed child-like to Jack, who was an almost elderly thirty years old, and were obviously not yet of drinking age.  These youths had smooth skin, with pimples and skin blemishes.  To Jack they seemed like they belonged in high school, and he knew it had probably not been long since they had been there.
A few of the students were older.  Jack thought of them as Just-Turned-21ers, which was a period of life, he knew from experience, that lasted anywhere from five to fifty years.  They usually wore more exotic, bright, or “in fashion” clothing.  At school they were the ones who took expert drags off cigarettes, spoke loudly to each other, spoke loudly on cell phones, offered sophisticated observations on the ridiculousness of the world around them, and cast incredibly lusty looks at nearly anyone within sight.  They reminded Jack, somewhat, of himself at their age. 
Standing in front of his seat, Jack put everything from his mind.  He slipped one arm out of his backpack, used his elbow to swing the heavy bag off of his other shoulder, and caught the pack by the strap with his left hand.  He turned and fell backwards, heavily landing on his backside, and sighed to himself as the cheaply cushioned seat quickly sank beneath his weight.  After lifting his right leg onto the empty seat, he pushed against the floor with his left to scratch and press his back into the metal wall.   Doing so made him feel, somehow, more a part of the seat, more comfortable.  Sheltered by the little cubby, he hugged his backpack to his chest as extra insulation against the cold day.  He dragged his glasses off of his face, folded their arms together, and slipped them into his jacket pocket.  Without any words to read he had no need to wear his glasses, and could give his strained eyes some rest.  
 The bus stopped.  Jack looked to his left, past disembodied necks and heads floating above seats, and watched an elderly couple very, very slowly disembark from the bus.  As he stared at them he felt… tired and… upset.  He didn’t understand why.
He had not been sitting for more than a few seconds, in the comfort of his favourite seat, before a sense of unhappiness pervaded his mind.  He reflected on it for awhile and considered the cause.  It was not his fellow passengers, he concluded.  They might have discolored his rosy portrait of the world a little, but their presence was what it was, and Jack could not change that fact.  Therefore their presence and existence did not overly upset him.  Jack thought of his money troubles, but they were minor and currently a stable factor in his life.  Jack had long ago learned to deal with the financial difficulties of academic life. 