Dylan, What Did You Do?

Let me start by saying that I do not intend every post on this blog to contain the F-word. However, because it is one of the most prevalent epithets that I see and hear on the city bus every day, and because that is where I find much of my general amusement, I can't help but include it.

You may have noticed that I started a list of random graffiti I've seen around town. I have to include another one that made me laugh ... then pause and think. It was scrawled in black marker across the back of a bench at a bus shelter, and it read simply "Fuck you Dylan." (It also included his last name, which I won't mention here.) Which begs the question: Dylan, what did you DO?!

Because I'm doubting that a minor transgression would warrant such a bold, public denunciation along the #4 and #141 bus route. I mean, you can't miss it. And it's not even close to anonymous. It is, essentially, the opposite of a declaration of love carved into a tree or painted on a water tower. It says very clearly, not "I heart you," but "You SUCK, and I want everyone to know it!"

This also begs the question: Why the bus bench? Did she just want maximum exposure without the cost of renting a billboard? Did he once pull the stop cord, break up with her, and bail out onto Johnson Street? Or does she know that he rides this bus and deserves a daily reminder of the fact that he is a miserable human being? In that case, have I sat next to him and failed to notice his slight wince as we pass it?

I'm assuming, of course, that the author is a jilted lover and that it is, in fact, a woman. This is normally a dangerous assumption in the heart of the Twin Cities, but I'm fairly certain that a man, even a gay one, would rather settle the matter with fists or silent fuming than be caught defacing public property with a Sharpie at 3 a.m.

Although I don't condone vandalism, I would like to hear Dylan's take on the whole issue. So I ride, and watch, and wait to see either an explanation or an apology tacked on below. With any luck, that bench may just become the foulest, most original message board ever created.