I
watch you. Around Christmas, you stood
in line at the toy store. Your kids were
stealing candy from the bins and you didn’t even notice. Their mouths were crusted with green rock
candy. One of them picked his nose and
left it in a bucket of caramel corn.
One
night, I saw the day glow of your window from the bus stop. The curtains were open, do you remember? You were sitting down to dinner.
Pot roast, was it, or maybe meat loaf? I
couldn’t tell. Your house is nicer
than mine. I wonder what your life feels
like.
You
were at my coffee shop. I had to find a
different table on the terrace. Across
the street, trees were just beginning to yellow. The
air tasted like fall. But I doubt you
noticed: you were on your cell phone,
telling the
whole restaurant about your life. Your
mother had a colonoscopy?
I
stood behind you on the elevator. You
were all dressed up. I wondered where
you were going. Those shoes you wore,
those aren’t practical. What’s
the
point? Who are you trying to
impress? For a minute I was worried you
were
going to turn around, like my thoughts had passed right into your head. I was practically breathing down your
neck. I bet you smelled my sour
breath.
I’ve
wanted to hurt you before, can I say that?
And it wasn’t even that you did something wrong. Maybe just the way you looked.
At
the park, I thought your daughters were lovely.
Could I have said that? Or would
it have been inappropriate?
When
you’re jogging, you check yourself out in the windows of cars you
pass. People will think you’re
trying to steal
something. And don’t worry about the
wrinkles under your eyes. I see you
playing with your wrinkles. I have them
too.
I
saw your car accident. I pulled over
after you went down in the ditch. Water
was up to the wheel wells. But you
wouldn’t have cared about the water; you could barely move. I shivered in the rain. Do
you want to hear what your face looked
like? There was so much glass in your
cheek. Your mouth opened and closed like
a fish. I didn’t want to touch you.
Before
you judge me, call me a voyeur or a liar or a narcissist, let me tell
you
something: you watch me too.
Do
you remember the subway? Our cars were
end to end in the dark tunnel. You looked
forward into my car, right at my face.
You must have thought it was a mirror (some people make that
mistake). You raised a hand to adjust
your glasses, and then looked shocked when my arm didn’t move.
We’ve
met before, remember? You passed me in
the hallway of your hotel. You had that
look. You know, that eight in the
morning look, before coffee, rubbing sleep from your eyes.
I smiled and said hello. You
didn’t.
I’ve
seen the way you look at me. You want to
know what makes me different. You might
have noticed the spots on my skin. Or
that the food I eat is different than your food.
Maybe
I’ve lived in Detroit and San Francisco, Madrid, Cairo. Maybe
you’ve been to
those places too, or maybe you haven’t.
Does it matter?
You
wonder why the lines on my face are longer than yours.
You wonder why I sit alone, why I have cream
cheese on my lips (can’t I eat right?), why I’m at the
airport bar at nine in
the morning (what’s wrong with me?).
Maybe
I know what war smells like. Do
you?
Maybe
my kids are older than yours, or shorter, fatter, dumber, taller,
smarter. Does that make me different?
You’ve
seen me at my worst and at my best.
Could you tell the difference? I
was seated on a park bench when you walked by.
The sun was coming up and I’d just gotten a new job. There were sweat stains under my arm pits, so
maybe you thought I’d been exercising, but I
hadn’t—caffeine, stress, they do
that sometimes. Did you know that was a
good day for me?
You
could ask me questions, but you don’t. Most
of the time, you don’t even want to look me in the eyes. You’ve thought terrible things about me. You’ve respected me.
Maybe it was my suit (my dress), the bounce
in my step, the briefcase I carried (the purse), the wrinkles in my
shirt, the
ten I left in the homeless man’s bucket, the old man I gave my
cab to. If you asked me questions,
you’d just be
scratching the surface.
After
the car accident, if you’d opened your eyes you would have seen
me standing in
the rain in my t-shirt. I wasn’t
ready
for that, but neither were you.
You
see me at the airport and the bus stop.
The grocery store. The interstate
rest stop off.
You
see me nearly every day. You call me that guy, woman, kid. You
call me stranger. You call me worse things. Maybe you need to wake up, or maybe I
do. Because you and me, we’re the
same.
I wrote this piece after a turbid week of conferences, airports, and hotel-stays. I was a little disjointed emotionally. I started to think about the way we treat strangers. These are people we meet everyday, people we spend a large part of our lives with, especially those of us who live in cities and tight urban spaces. It's a funny thing: the presumptions we make, the perceived differences, the jarring similarities. |