Morrill Middle School Crossing Guards

I pass the same crossing guards on my way to work every morning.

Talk about a team sport.  The two of them right outside Morrill Middle School playing traffic defense as school children crossing the street to the goal.  They zealously march into the road from each side, raise up their quintessential red stop signs, and blow their whistles swiftly.  Once in position, they give the signal, and the students flood the road.  Pretty standard procedure one could say.

The two guards wear their pressed, standard issued uniforms each morning.  The first is a short, elder Asian man with silvery-grey hair, and a bushy mustache to match.  He stands stiff as a board and always looks stone faced, except when interacting with the other guard - an overweight, curly haired black woman.  She seems like fun.  He seems too serious.  The perfect team for chaperoning young students to school across a busy road.

While standing on the side of the road, she's constantly engaged in this back-and-forth swinging/dance motion as she nonchalantly raises her white-gloved hands about waist high.  She looks like an overgrown child trying to balance on roller skates for the first time.  She's either waving to passing cars, or dancing to music through her silly Bluetooth ear piece.  I always choose to wave back, hoping it's the former.  We're basically either friends at this point, or dance partners.

He's always glaring at drivers passing by as if each one has personally offended him by driving over the crosswalk.  He has a silly Bluetooth ear piece, also.  Maybe those, too, are standard issue.  Mr. Serious is pretty much a statue on the side of the road until that sidewalk corner starts to fill with students.  And when he feels ready, he'll just suddenly jump out in to traffic and blow his whistle.

"TWEEEEEEEET!"

And after just missing the last car through the intersection by inches, he'll stare at the back windshield as it drives past, guilt his only tool.  He's classic.

I bet they're like best friends by now.  This is at least their second year working as a team every morning to accomplish the worthy goal of getting young people safely across the street.  They even acessorize the same!  Hell, I only drive by once a day and I wave like we're friends.  But to clarify, I'm not waving to him.  He's too serious and will jump out into the crosswalk with his stop sign held high for good measure as I pass through.  And I can't afford to start my day off with that horrible stare in my rear-view mirror.