Walking Down the Street

I have always had this uncanny ability to attract random conversations with complete strangers.  This has happened to me throughout my entire life.  Almost every time I am standing in a line anywhere, or waiting in a doctor's office, someone decides that they want to strike up a conversation with me.  Maybe I just look like someone who likes to listen, who knows.

Well this afternoon as I was walking down the street towards Starbucks, this charming little family walked by with the most perfectly dressed children I have ever seen.  They looked like miniature adults, and I literally did a double take as they passed me on the street.  Just as I was about to resume my journey, I noticed a woman on the opposite side of the sidewalk that had looked back at the little family as well.  We kind of smiled at each other and she said to me, "Are those not the more precious little ones eva?"  to which I honestly replied, "Well they were wearing the most adorable clothes I've ever seen, but I have to admit that I know some pretty cute kids back home."

Maybe it was the honesty in my answer, maybe it was the fact that I answered at all, but before I knew it we had been talking for about twenty minutes.  I stood there and listened as this woman gave me an only slightly condensed version of her life story.  She told me all about her friend's kids, and how much she had wanted kids of her own.  She told me of past loves, and travels, and unrealized hopes and dreams.

I have to admit that I was slightly taken aback at first by this woman's candor.  It has been my experience with British people that they are not generally a very open nation.  I think I exchanged more words with this one woman than I have with all of the other British people I have met combined.  Most Brits wouldn't share some of these things with their closest friends let alone with a complete stranger and I think after about the twenty-five minute mark this very fact finally hit this woman.  She suddenly stopped talking, looked up at me, and said, "Dear Lord!  Why haven't you shut me up?"

I kind of chuckled and told her the most honest thing I could think to say, "You know, sometimes it's easier to talk to a stranger than it is to someone who knows the whole backstory.  I understand, and it had been my pleasure to listen to everything that you had to say."  She looked moderately shocked, probably more by her own openness than by my response, smiled at me warmly, and thanked me.  I bid her farewell and we then went our separate ways.

Of all the things I have done this weekend, this single moment has stuck out in my mind.  Of all the clubs, the pubs, the monuments, the cathedrals, this was the most significant thing I could think of to write about.  There was no one with me to share the experience.  No pictures were taken, or fuss made.  I didn't have to get ready and put make up on to have this conversation.  It wasn't obscured by alcohol, or sleep deprivation, or even amazement, which is sometimes even more clouding than any substance could be.  It was just a moment of real honesty between two people.  A moment when I was able to be a sort of human diary for a woman that needed somewhere to store her thoughts.  A thirty minute period where I was actually useful to another human spirit, and that is about the most I could ask to be in this crazy world of ours.