Massachusetts State Police

On February 19, 2014, I was waiting for a Peter Pan bus (headed back to Boston) at the new pick up location in the Lee Outlet Mall. It was raining. The NYC-bound bus arrived and paused for a minute or so — which gave me time to get out of the car and go to the front door to ask about the Boston-bound bus. The driver told me that it would be arriving shortly. He pulled out, and I returned to wait in my mom's car. The next thing I knew, I saw another Peter Pan bus — which had arrived from a different direction in the parking lot — following the first bus down the hill and out of the mall. I don't think it had even paused at the new bus stop. I got out of the car and jumped up and down, waving my arms in disbelief and hoping that the second bus driver might see me in his rear view mirror. It was at this point that a MA state trooper, who had been parked nearby in the mall parking lot, put on his flashing lights and chased after the bus. I thought, "He can't be going to stop the bus for me," but waited to see what happened next. The trooper returned in a minute and told me that the second bus was waiting in a lower parking lot for me. I jumped back in the car, and my mom drove me down to the lower parking lot, where I was able to board the bus. Since I was in a rush to get on the bus, I didn't stop to get the name of the extremely helpful state trooper. But I remain very grateful for his powers of observation (seeing me jumping up and down and yelling at the rapidly departing second bus) and his initiative (throwing on his lights and driving after the bus to stop it on my behalf). PS: The bus driver was completely unapologetic for not having stopped to wait for passengers at the new bus stop. And I had purchased my ticket in advance; so in theory he could have known that there was at least one passenger waiting to be picked up. Hurrah for the MA state trooper (and the opposite of hurrah for the Peter Pan bus driver)!