What Goes Around, Comes Around

Image: Petr Kratchovil

For reasons which elude me, I found myself walking to the bus stop, thinking of an encounter I had on the East Side, in another lifetime.

Okay, it was THIS lifetime. But so long ago that it hardly FEELS as though it were the same lifetime. And I don't know what made me think of it . . . maybe the woman who pulled up next to me at the corner, muttering under her breath.

What I remembered was waiting outside a friend's apartment on the Upper East Side, "guarding" the car while he ran in to pick up clean underwear or fried chicken or a red beret or Dan Post boots or some something . . . I don't really remember what.

What I DO remember is that a man who bore a striking resemblance to a curly-headed Woody Allen came over to the car and began screaming at me. I mean SCREAMING. Move the car I was blocking the whole road (I wasn't) and who did I think I was and people like me were the trouble with the world today and . . . oh my goodness, my mother told me never to use those words!!

And I laughed. His reaction was SO over the top and his face was so red and his hair so unruly that it was really hard to take him seriously. My laughter probably didn't help the situation . . . but in between guffaws I did try to calm him down but to no avail.

If memory serves, my friend came down, loaded his gear in the car and we pulled out . . . leaving our Woody Allen-esque nemesis with his trench coat flapping in the wind as he ran down the street after us, shaking his fist.

It was quite a scene. Not the sort of thing one forgets easily.

And so, several months later . . . perhaps even so much as a year later . . . when I saw this same man at the bus stop in my Washington Heights neighborhood, I was wary. . . braced for almost anything. Except what actually happened.

What happened was that this man struck up a perfectly pleasant conversation with me that day. And the day after that. And then again, the day after that. Our schedules merged frequently, and we would ride downtown together, often chatting the entire way. He told me how much he enjoyed speaking with me and what a pleasure I was . . . how commuting with me always brightened his day. A kind of friendship blossomed . . . he would tell me of his frustrations with his ailing mother and her oversized apartment, and of his devotion to his stubborn but steadfast lover. He gave me recipes and restaurant tips and always was eager to discuss theatre and film and literature with me.

And never, not once, did he seem to recognize me from our earlier encounter.

His mother became very ill and he began to commute downtown less often. My father also was ill and I went to Virginia to be with him, and with my mother. Soon after my return from that trip, I left the neighborhood and my newfound friend and I lost touch with one another.

For me, the lesson of our encounter was three-fold. First, a reminder of what J.M. Barrie said about always being a little kinder than necessary. And second, a reminder not to judge people based on one episode of bad behavior. His behavior that first day suggested a nasty, bitter person. But our subsequent conversations revealed a man who was vulnerable and sad about losing his mother and a little lonely besides. Which brings me to the third and most valuable lesson: The things that other people say or do to us almost always have almost nothing to do with us and, instead, have almost everything to do with them.

I'm not advocating screaming at the top of one's lungs at strangers, mind you . . . just saying that if it happens to you, you don't have to yell back. (Of course, I know some of you will anyway!)