The Quiite Bearable Lightness of Being

Two quite lovely interpersonal exchanges this afternoon. The first with a woman on date/not-date with all the complications (if only in my mind) that equivocation implies, the second afterwards, with a streetcar conductor after I had left his vehicle.

As is my wont, I exchanged thanks and "have a good evening" with the bearded driver, then quickly ran down the stairs, having noted there was no oncoming traffic. A child of the 20th century, I prefer not to wait for 30 seconds, if I can scoot in front of a multi-ton vehicle and scamper across the street before it lumbered into motion.

Mr. Wind foiled my jay-walking plan, blowing my hat onto the pavement behind me. I stopped, bulls-eye to the streetcar, and scampered toward the curb, stooped for my hat and placed it tight upon my balding pate.

The streetcar still had not moved. The driver was watching me. I smiled and nodded and gave him a salute - My bad. Please go ahead. And he grinned and nodded, accepting and acknowledging our brief communication and the steel wheels began to turn.

And that, Mrs. Thatcher, is just one minute example of Society and why it is not only real but why it is so important.

I stood and watched the Red Rocket roll along (not to mention the many passengers aboard), happy to have exchanged that communication with a stranger and I have no dought he, too, was happy to have had an exchange with a fellow human.

* * *
Speaking of humans, I suppose my date/not date was in fact, not really a date.

Emily is an acquaintance of the ex, who has actually been at my apartment once. We friended each other through myspace, though I didn't realize we had met in person. She and Laura had been in school together (though Emily was a year behind).

Anyway, she saw me and smiled at me a month or so ago at Java, but I was too stupid to stop and say hello. But I wasn't too stupid to write to her myspace profile and say, "Was that you who smiled at me at Java?" And she said, yes, that was me - I thought you didn't recognize me or were concentrating on something else.

Long story short, we agreed we should meet, once she was done with exams. (Yes, she's only 18. Yes, if I want a relationship, she isn't someone I should be chasing.)

Anyway, today our schedules finally meshed, and we got together. Not for as long as I would have liked (else you wouldn't be reading this now), but long enough for me to say that I've met yet another young woman that I like and lust after at the same time. And she has a girlfriend.

Can I pick 'em or can't I?

But what the hell. Another woman I like and who I think is very attractive and who probably isn't interested in me "that way" at all.

But you know? It's worth it. Emily is someone I would like to spend more time with and I am very pleased to have met in the flesh. I think she'll condescend to spend time with me again and I think we will learn from each other.

And I think I am discreet enough that, if she notices that I appreciate her physical beauty, that she'll accept it as a complement rather than feel assaulted by the gaze of a dirty old man.

In any case, it feels good to be exposed to a new, intelligent person, whose life experience is very different from my own.

And now I'm going to leave you be, to flirt with another inappropriate women, who has just returned from a class trip to Italy.

Ciao (as they say).