Conversations with Strangers

So the other night, on the way back from the club, I struck up a conversation with the cab driver. He asked me if I had a boyfriend, I told him no. He said, "no one pleased you, is that it?" I said, "must be it." And he started in, talking about how love is painful, and we all get our hearts broken, and it's just worse if you try and prevent it. The day before I was walking out of the post office and I saw a man with a clipboard limping along the sidewalk. "Do you have five minutes, ma'am?" I am a total sucker for anyone who calls me ma'am. I stopped. He told me he was collecting money for a hospital, I asked to see his permit. He told me his legs were paralyzed, and that he'd collected money in the past. He said, "Come back and I'll take you to the hospital, you will see incredible need." And he took off his hat and showed me the scar where he'd been hit in the head with a hammer years ago.

From other cab drivers, I've learned that Nigeria has a Christian South and a Muslim North and an entirely conflicted present, that it's been ruled by various rival factions for years. That UIC is more racially diverse than Northwestern (an observation a blind man could make, I'm sure) and that Romanian is more similar to the romance languages than the Slavic languages. I've gotten directions around town from the mendicants outside of CVS. I've discussed love and relationships with tour guides, beggars and missionaries. Last year, I spent an hour debating liberal politics with the janitor, and this year I exchange all kinds of greetings in Spanish with the woman who cleans the bathrooms.

What's the point of this monologue? That I start conversations with strangers. And while occasionally these conversations end creepily, overall they prove extremely rewarding. How often does it happen that you're driving home through the rainy streets of Chicago with someone born fifty years ago in another country, lamenting the fact that both of you are looking for love in all the wrong places?

(Don't count all the times you've seen "Lost in Translation.")