It’s amazing how a single encounter with a person can linger in your memory for ages after a brief but significant exchange of pleasantries. I have had a decent number of these in my life, each of which has taught me a lesson I keep safely tucked deep inside, but I want to share three of these stories. This is the first in a series of three.
The First and most recent was set in a college hallway filled with lockers that at some point in my life seemed a lot larger than they were that day. I’d finished writing an exam at about 9:00 that I’d started writing at 6:30 and was waiting for Farah of Caution: Keep out of the reach of children to give me a lift home when I noticed, pacing the hallways, an extremely good looking Caucasian man. He was tall, cinnamon tanned, cleanly shaven, broad, totally casually trendy, with perfectly placed bleach blonde hair and the most gorgeous pair of green eyes I’d ever seen. For as far as I can remember I’ve never ever been attracted to the surfer guy look. All my encounters with the type have thus far proven unworthy of mention. It’s my experience that they’re so far removed from the type of conversation I enjoy engaging in that I unintentionally find myself steering clear of any such circumstance. I’d seen this guy at our last class briefly when he dropped in for a couple of minutes then disappeared at break and so, with absolutely nothing better to do, I plopped myself down on the floor in front of him and asked him why he hadn’t written the exam. He casually responds “I arrived at 7:30 and I’ve just always been told, growing up, that it’s rude to interrupt a class once it has begun. That’s why I’m out here. I’m waiting for the professor to finish so I can explain to him that I couldn’t interrupt. I just hope he’ll empathize with me and appreciate my reason.” I chuckled and looked at him and said “you know what?! That’s pure genius. I’ve never heard that one before. It might just work then sneaky you can have an extra week to study!” The poor guy was mortified and smiled uncomfortably then said “I’m not kidding I’m serious.” At this point I’m back peddling like no tomorrow wracking my brains trying to find something to tension you could cut with a knife when I come up with: “So where exactly did you go to school? That’s so bizarre and sounds a little militant. I imagine you came away with loads of stories to tell?” We start talking and it turns out he went to the same private school I went to and so I was eventually able to salvage the conversation by poking fun. Just when I think I’m safe and in the shallow end of the pool, Hot White Guy hits me with another jaw dropper. He’s social. He’s got a sense of humor, doesn’t think I ride a camel to work, and above all keeps the conversation going. He asks all sorts of questions one of which was are you doing this full time or part time. I respond and throw the question back at him only to have him proclaim that he’s taking 5 courses. At this point I’m a little confused and thinking surely he knows that the few months of summer we do get are a rare precious commodity in this god forsaken frigid land. “But how do you expect to keep that cinnamon tan of yours going without the beach and all the partying that goes along with it?” He chuckles and explains that he’s not much for parties and that he’d rather do other things than get drunk. “I just want to get my ducks in a row and have my head on straight. I read and play golf” I’m completely dumb founded because without talking to him I wouldn’t have for one second taken him for an extremely polite guy then he tells me he doesn’t like getting drunk, reads and wants to get his head straight? Do such people exist?! Just as he finishes his sentence Farah and the professor step out and so we both get up off the ground and he tells the professor he needs to speak to him and naturally expecting that to be the end of our conversation I start to walk away when he steps back a couple of steps and says “I’m Gerald. It was nice talking to you” And just like that, with a few sentences Gerald has eternally become imprinted in my list of people I’ll always remember. It’s not that I’ve never met a really nice perfect stranger before but it’s my reaction and intake that has me all weirded out. It’s the fact that, as D insightfully pointed out, I was stereotyping. And though I certainly will not allow myself to do it on a conscious level it is insightful to learn that many people might, just as did, maybe doing it intentionally. I think on some level or another grand sweeping generalizations like: I’m not like the rest of the world I never stereotype, All pretty people are dumb as a door knob, All North Americans are ignorant and unaware of the world beyond their continent and all Canadian people think getting drunk is equated with a good time are just that. Sweeping generalizations are a based on faulty logic that just make people feel comfortable and safe. Gerald solidified the notion that to every rule there is an exception and taught me that even the watch dogs need watching.
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