The guy sitting next to me listening to funk music so loud I can hear it through his headphones begins to kick at cigarette butts on the asphalt and suddenly stands up, thrashing wildly at the pile of soda cans and other garbage that surrounds our bench.

I know how he feels. My public transportation experiment began with the best of intentions, but after five hours of bus transfers, being clammy with sweat, walking and worrying, I can pretend to deliberate, but I know what I'll do.

I reach for the phone.

 *****

I really wanted this to work. My car is 14 years old. Traffic is lousy. And I'm not only the victim of a pay cut, but I also don't want to shell out more money to Middle Eastern oil sheiks.

So in some ways, I viewed Dump the Pump Day as a key to freedom and a way to live efficiently. It would give me a rare opportunity to save gas money and let the car rest from the usual 42-mile, 90-minute round trip. The national event in June embodied almost all those reasons and considering I had done it in other cities, I figured it would be easy.

I was wrong.

For starters, it took me three hours and four buses to get from my New Smyrna Beach house to The Daytona Beach News-Journal office -- the same length of time it would take to drive to south Georgia. I found the bus stops conveniently located and considering the morning sun hadn't yet met its full potential, I arrived to work feeling only a little sweaty, but in awe of the people who have to make the journey every day.

Of course not everyone has a commute as bad as mine. Annie Ferrante, 50, made it sound like riding the bus is a breeze.

At the time we met, the Port Orange beauty consultant was in her second week of riding the No. 12 and was still charmed by the challenge of riding it to work in Daytona Beach. It takes her about 45 minutes-- probably about twice as long as a car ride.

"I really don't mind it," she said. "They do the driving and it's nice and cool. The folks are friendly and I'm a reader, so somewhere along the way I'll be reading a book."

Strangely enough, riding the bus with a bunch of random people is Ferrante's alone time. And not so surprisingly, her friends ragged on her about the decision.

"Before I got on the bus, some friends would say, 'Oh, no, you're going to hate it,'" she said. "But I love it. It's my solitude."

It helps that Ferrante's home and work are near stops along the bus line. It's not so easy for Michael Valentino, a lanky 23-year-old from Edgewater who rides the bus for more than three hours in search of temporary work in Daytona Beach. When he misses the last bus of the day, he tries to stay at a family member's house.

"It's a pain in the (rear)," he said, as we rode in the chilly No. 7 on our way to the Transfer Plaza in Daytona Beach. His car was damaged beyond repair during the record flooding in May. "I gotta take like three buses. If I ride it a week, it's going to come out more expensive than if I put in gas."

Valentino wonders why our transit system can't be more like New York City, where he used to live and could catch a ride every 15 minutes.

But the Volusia-Flagler area just isn't set up for a system that could balance the convenience of commuters with a realistic budget, said Liz Suchsland, Votran's assist general manager of operations and maintenance. "It's just not comparable to New York or Washington, D.C. where things are in close proximity to each other."

Votran's operating budget of $20.5 million generated 3.4 million boardings last year. The bus system provides the type of service that mostly caters to the "transit-dependent," Suchsland said, such as the elderly, students, the disabled and those who are unable to drive or can't afford a vehicle.

"Certainly somebody living beachside in New Smyrna, who wants to get into the core Daytona area using the transit system has limited options," she said.

Like a three-hour commute.

"For a traditional work schedule it would be somewhat of a challenge," Suchsland added.

No kidding. 

 *****

My challenge was trying to get out of the office before 2:30 p.m.

Barely working half a shift, I rushed out of the newsroom about an hour later and arrived at the Dunlawton Square strip mall in Port Orange too late to catch the last transfer to New Smyrna Beach. I stared at all the schedules and routes in disbelief, checking and re-checking the times to see if I was reading it wrong.

Maybe the guy with the funky music missed his bus too? Trying not to upset him further, I remained motionless as he took his trash-kicking episode to another bench.

Sitting alone, I felt defeated as I reached for my cell phone to ask for a ride home.

A friend answered on the third ring as I daydreamed about a cold shower.

"Can you come get me?" I said. "I give up." 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Photo by David Massey

The three8six bonfire and drum circle gathering was another great success on Friday in New Smyrna Beach. The community came out in droves with party "equipment," rhythm and dance. There were djembe drums, hula hoops, glow sticks and glowing poi balls in full swing.

Karl Miranda, owner of Drum4wellness, and Chuck Theroux, who hand carves Earth Flutes in NSB, played artfully.  

The ocean waves and pink sky provided the backdrop for the collective voice, which rose at sunset. About 400 people were there experiencing this rare, local drum release, as bodies swung wildly around the fire in a tribal dance of sorts. 

Things got started around 7 p.m., and heated up at nightfall. I'm sure many people feel the same when I say "my only wish is that we could have played longer."  (Unfortunately our bonfire permit expired at 11 p.m. and we had to clean up in order to remain good standing with the Volusia County Beach Patrol).

Miranda, who facilitated the recreational music making, said in addition to the good energy a circle like ours emitted, there are healing attributes from such community gatherings.

"There is no medicine more therapeutic than self expression," said Miranda, who does lots of community work throughout the county and caters to private events. "It's our first defense." 

And there is research to support that. According to the therapy division of  Remo drum company, HealthRHYTHYMS, group drumming reduces stress-related hormones and increases natural killer cell activity -- white blood cells that seek out and destroy cancer and virally infected cells.

In a 2001 study at a wellness center in Pennsylvania, Remo cited that researchers concluded drumming has the potential to change classic stress response characteristics.   

Another study, published in 2005, details that recreational music making reversed 19 genetic switches that turn on the stress response believed to be responsible for development of common diseases.

Short summary: drumming can be good for your health.

Plus, you get to meet new people! (Hi Ron, Mari, Valerie and Robert!)

Now that you know it goes beyond a night of fun, it's time to start talking about what's next. 

I know many of you hope we'll be doing this again soon, but we need your ideas for new locations and dates. Sea turtles are laying eggs and hatching May 1 through Oct. 31st, so the beach is off limits.

But as Robert said, while the beach provides great atmosphere, it's the drums and the people behind them that provide the energy.    

So where to fellow Three8six people? Campground, a park or private property? Let's talk about it on this forum.

Also, if you're looking to drum this weekend, meet up with the Drum4wellness group in St. Augustine in front of Ripley's Believe it or Not! Museum. Drumming begins shortly after Miranda's 11:30 a.m. radio interview in front of the museum on Saturday and will  continue every hour on the hour for 15 to 20 minutes for the duration of the day.

The call came at an unusual hour. Not that 9 p.m. is bad, but I don't hear from this friend often, let alone late on a Thursday evening.

"I want to talk to you about something," he said. "Call me back at your convenience." 

I called this fellow journalist back, thinking he probably wanted to talk about how to approach a story or talk about multimedia. But that had nothing to do with it.

Rumors are swirling at his company. He doesn't know what to expect about the future of the west coast newspaper and it's no secret that papers throughout the country are suffering in this faltering economy.

My colleague doesn't know how much longer he'll have a job--a feeling that's surely universal from Wall Street moguls to Starbucks baristas. Everyone is worried.

Rather than obsess about what might happen, I told him it's best to prepare for the worst. You may roll your eyes at this, but I believe that making yourself sick with stress, isn't going to help.

For one, stress goes beyond just mental effects by affecting your relationships with your significant other, your physical health, and in turn your job performance.

I'm no financial advisor, but in my opinion the only thing that's going to save us in the tough times ahead is a healthy savings account.

In the last month, I've discovered the boredom that comes with frugality. I no longer drive past the window of my favorite dress boutique, out of fear of tempting myself or staring hopelessly at some beautiful bohemian piece I probably would have bought without thinking twice last year. I make sure I don't let anything rot in the fridge--something I should have never let happen in the first place. Long gone are the days of weekly sushi feasts with sake and whatever else my heart desired.

Now it's all about home-cooked meals (which are more along the lines of sandwiches because I'm usually too tired to cook). Instead of shopping or movies on weekends, I'm in my kayak--where it's free of charge to explore local waterways for entertainment.

The changes in lifestyle became all the more amplified after a couple of phone calls last week. My landlord said she couldn't afford to keep my house. Thankfully it's not in foreclosure, but it is going to be up for sale.

Her used car business isn't holding up, she said, so she's liquidating property. My boyfriend, coworker and I can live in it until it gets sold. Then, its time to scrounge up money for a deposit and moving expenses.

That same fateful Monday, another friend in the Web development business got an alarming message from his boss. His job was safe, but they needed to talk.

He has taken a pay cut, but others in his company weren't so fortunate. Our close friend lost her job that day, proceeding to drown her fears and anger in copious amounts of alcohol. In hysterics the next day, she told him she hoped the company would go out of business (and that's just a polite translation of how she phrased it).

It's too early to tell what will happen to his friendship. But hearing bitterness isn't a good sign.
Judging from my own experience, layoffs can dissolve relationships.

I no longer talk to a woman who I thought was a good friend of mine. About a month after she got laid off, I invited her to a fancy dinner for her birthday in hopes of cheering her up.

Instead, we had strained conversation.

She didn't want to talk about her job leads because she didn't want to get her hopes up. She didn't want to hear about my latest journalist adventures because it reminded her of the job she didn't have anymore. She asked about former coworkers and wondered aloud, why they hadn't called to see how she was doing.

That awkward dinner was more than six months ago. She later confided that it was hard to see me because of our past work history. We haven't talked much since, although I know she thankfully found a good job.

Like you and the lawmakers in Washington, I don't know when our economy will be revived. But until then, I'm going to do something that's totally cliché. I'm going to stay positive and be there for those friends through the worst of it. 

I hope you will too.