That was… something. I just passed by L. out on 35th Avenue. I did not recognize her at first, being as she was underneath many layers of winter attire. She smiled and said hi. Otherwise I would have not known that was her. She turned away and stopped walking for a second. I thought she might say something. But she had stopped walking because she was waiting for her mother to cross the street. I had not seen her at first. They appeared to be heading to Sunswick, which seemed appropriate. The fact that she smiled and said hi seems slightly surprising, but not stopping to chat makes sense on account of her mother’s presence and how freaking cold it is. Being from Texas she really hates the cold, as I remembered. In turn that reminded me of her comment on how my heart beat so hard it sounded like it would bust from my chest. She also memorably described me, 9 or 10 years ago when we’d just met, as “always awkward”, adding that this was fine with her. I liked that comment and kept it with me all these years. So she’s not all bad, right? Hah.
I was wearing the jacket she claimed to utterly and bitterly detest. I wonder if she even remembers that. She seems like someone who has to keep track of a lot of little lies.
I made one attempt to contact her the night after she looked like she wanted to murder me and threw a bunch of objects. She ignored my contact, and I never tried again. It took a while to fully register with me how that look in her face and the threat of physical violence was not a joke or anything to even discuss. It was what you’d call a deal breaker. Still, there is no reason we can’t be friends. I might send her a message now that is was “nice to see your smiling face again”. We knew how to make great conversation but no way am I ready to change my mind about anything else.
Or I could wait for her to say something. Because that is never going to happen.
A funny thing was that I had just connected two LinkNYC kiosks into a conference call, as is my habit of late. It has many effects, among them the possibility that the loudspeakers will emit feedback and a lot of noise. It also allows me to broadcast over the kiosks by connecting to the conference call from a regular phone. L. and her mother were heading in the direction of those two kiosks I had just connected. If I had my wits about me I would have called in to the conference and shouted something for them to hear as they passed by. But I did not think of it in time. This cold weather seems to genuinely impair my ability to think straight. Too bad, it could have made for interesting conversation later, should there be any.
It is eerie to think about the possibilities of that LinkNYC “broadcast” scenario. You could call your own phone from one of these things then stand away, saying creeper things to passers-by who you can see from your perch but they cannot see you. It sounds like something Letterman would have done, but to me the possibilities are less comedic than creepy. If you can get someone to stop and listen to your voice coming out of that thing — and that’s pretty easy to do I found the few times I tried this — then you have them stationary and where you want them… assuming you want them.
