One of the joys of living in a small community is that if you’re hoping to run into someone you know, the chances of it happening are excellent. (One of the sucky things about living in a small community is that you’re also likely to run into people you’d rather not. Oh well.)

Anyway, it was with great jubilee today that I parked at the grocery store and noted a friend-of-a-friend pulling her van out of a nearby parking spot. I didn’t want to appear over-eager so I ran up along side her door and pounded on the window while she was checking traffic behind her. She only had a minor aneurysm. Then I caused a ten-car pileup there in the lot while I insisted she roll down her window to talk to me, rather than allowing her to go home and unpack her groceries.

Don’t you wish I lived in your town?

I had a good reason for doing what I did: we needed to talk. I haven’t seen this woman in months, and we had some catching up to do. I wanted to know how she was doing. I wanted to hear how life was going for her. I wanted to tell her she has lousy taste in men.

The conversation went sort of like this:

Me: Hey! How are you?
Her: Wha… oh! Hi! I’m well, how are you?
Me: Oh, I’m doing great. Hey, I got a job!
Her: That’s great! Where?
Me: [fill her in on job]
Her: Awesome, it sounds great.
Me: Yeah, it really is!
Her: Chicken’s on sale this week.
Me: Yeah? Great, I need some chicken.
Her: Yeah, I should probably get mine home–
Me: Oh, sure, of course. But, um, have you seen [weird guy who she tried to fix me up with] lately?
Her: Oh! Yeah! Well, no, but I’m going to see him this weekend. Hey, did he ever call you?
Me: Well… [proceed to fill her in on the fiasco of said man contacting me again and again and never actually asking me out but also refusing to just go away]
Her: Oh. My. God. Really?
Me: Yeah, really.
Her: What an idiot.
Me: Yeah. I mean, I appreciate that you were trying to do something nice, but–
Her: He blew it.
Me: Pretty much, yeah.
Her: I am SO SORRY. What an idiot. I’m going to yell at him.
Me: Uhhhh, no, don’t do that. But if you see him? Feel free to tell him you think maybe I’m dating someone else.
Her: HA, okay, no problem.
Me: Thanks.
Her: I think all those cars behind me want me to move.
Me: What? Oh. Sorry, I’ll let go of your side mirror, now. Nice seeing you!