Encounters at the Airport

25 MAR 2010

 

A girl approached me today at the airport. I was sitting reading Anna Karenina by Tolstoy and I saw her approaching with my peripheral vision. She was smiling. She sat down next to me and said hello but never introduced herself. She asked if I was headed to Phoenix and I said yes. She proceeded to tell me about her motorcycle, dual engine- something like that. The entire time I was thinking, “Why me?” But not in an annoyed way. I am genuinely curious: why me? Of everyone she could have talked to, why did she approach me? What was her motivation? What was she thinking? The seat next to me wasn’t the only one available. Was it the closest? As she proceeded to tell me about her trip to Phoenix, her cat Olga, her father who had left her mother for another woman (and has since gotten engaged to another woman she isn’t so fond of). I was able to catch her name in dialogue. She was playing the role of her mother, asking her to get out of bed to plough a road she had already tried to plough (25 inches worth I think). “Eli, Eli get up. You promised you’d plough the road.” I think she said she’s from Spokane. But mentioned being close to Idaho. I should revisit my U.S. geography- how embarrassing. 

Posted via email from soundslikecindy's posterous