There is a woman I’ve been interested in for a long time. She lives on the block, and has lived there for probably 8 or 9 years. I think she is 40 or so. By turns I think she is beautiful, then I think she looks like a man. But her body, oh my, that body, and that attitude. She exudes confidence and even authority. I wish I knew what she does for a living. I believe she works from home, doing what I have no idea.

The interest actually stems from the fact that she used to say hi to me. It was always in a way that seemed to not expect a reply nor did it signal an opening toward being friendly. Friends are hard to make but in return for her saying hello a few times I tried to return the gesture. It never went anywhere.

Yesterday she happened to be heading to the subway at the same time as I. I don’t think this has ever happened. My regard for her took a sharp hit when I spotted her not paying the subway fare. She ducked under the turnstile like a common thief. I don’t even know if I could be friends with that. Yeah, my standards are too high…

She was dressed up fine. Black boots, tight denim jeans, a lot of makeup, large gold circle-shaped earrings, and she was continuing to apply nailpolish on the train. It stunk, but not too badly. Still, another character trait to consider as my admiration for her quickly evaporated.

She seemed mostly serene. I only followed after her for a little while, wanting only to divine some piece of information about her. Where does she work, if not from home? Where does she go? How can I even get her name, which is something I typically have the sleuthing skills to manage but not this time.

At 14th Street/Union Square she exited the train. I thought she was heading to the L train, and if she had gone there the quest would have ended. As blissfully unaware as she seemed with regard to my presence I did not want to push things too far. There’s no payoff at the end of this rainbow. I just wantto know who she is and what she does.

She stepped upstairs and entered the Whole Foods. It seemed clear she was not there to shop for anything. She was looking at her phone intently, as if following instructions, or waiting for a specific communication. She approached the down escalator thinking it was the up escalator. Realizing her mistake she found the proper escalator to get up to the 2nd floor. She had no interest in anything Whole Foods. After about 10 minutes she made her way to the exit where, as I had expected, she met up with a man in what appeared to be a “first date” meeting, probably from online dating.

While this doesn’t reveal much, it does at least confirm that she is single and dating. But any other clues into how she spends her days were not gleaned from this brief attempt. It was hapless and futile and I pretty well knew it from the start. Between being a fare-evader and stinkily doing her nails on a subway there are sure to be other character traits that would make us hate each other.

I used to do this more frequently. I would follow a complete stranger just to see where they went and what I could learn about their lives from simple observation. It’s a childhood game.