Thursday, July 14, 2005

Random meaningless encounter

I'm walking down the street, a tad irate that I had left my wallet at home, and was thus unable to get my fix of Starbucks. As I'm strolling in the 90 degree weather, an older man wearing what appears to be a hawaiian shirt and a straw hat is walking towards me. He stops to ask me where a certain store is. Being the good samaritan that I am, I point out that he is going the wrong way, that it's actually the opposite direction. He says he just came from that direction and didn't see it. He then reverses and starts walking alongside me as I'm explaining that I'm pretty sure the store is the way I'm walking.

Then we get to the corner where I make my right onto another street. I tell him to just continue on the street and he should see the store. Instead of continuing on, he stands there and chats a bit. He asks me questions about the town, if I'm in school, where I went to school, where I'm from, what I like to do for fun, etc. After several minutes, it's apparent he has no intention of ending this conversation anytime soon. I smile and nod.

I start to give my exit signs like, facing my body another direction, sighing that "Okay gotta go" sigh, etc. He keeps asking me questions about life and the town and tells me about his life. Every time I'm about to turn and walk away, he asks another question and thoroughly explores each relevant tangent. When I finally find a pause in the conversation, I say "Okay I gotta get going, good luck finding that store." As I'm eagerly walking away, he says to me, "Can we exchange numbers?" I turn back to him briefly to reply "No, thanks," and walk away.

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