affectionate stranger

affectionate strangers
I went and got my hair cut yesterday and had one of those experiences I dread; where the woman cutting it feels she knows better than I how I should wear it. She cut it shorter than I wanted (it’s quite long, typically) and all night long it seemed to invite people playing with it, brushing it out of my face, tugging at it as though that would make it grow.

I went out dancing and there was a woman in pig tails determined to talk to me. She passed inches from me and paused for a moment to look me dead in the eyes, before hovering nearby for some time. I was talking to my friend Mallory, but when she went to the bar to get a drink the woman with the pigtails came to speak to me. I couldnt for the life of me make out what she was saying, except that she was 40, she had just come from something having to do with the NOLA Red dress run and that she didn’t normally wear tennis shoes to the bar. She left after a few more awkward attempts at conversation, but she was always close by.

She hovered about for a bit and then on her way out she passed by, swept my hair out of my face and kissed me on the cheek, lingering for just a moment as though something more might come of it.

Mallory went prematurely gray in her early 20’s and wears it like a badge. She’d been discussing the fact that it invited people playing with it, as though touching it would prove that what they were seeing was real. She’s not a fan of affectionate strangers, she told me after mine had gone.

I've come to realize that others know that my wanting to avoid being cruel can be preyed on, used to manipulate me. I've fallen for it so many times in the past, but now, taking a step back, i'm realizing when it happens.

 When people go their separate ways, you can't usually expect one to console the other. We have to find people in each of our own lives to listen to us, bring us comfort. To ask each other to do that can be cruel, in that you never learn to live without the other person. You must learn to eat, breathe, live and love without that person, just like you did before them. 

 Tears and prayers and excuses after you've already made up your mind won't make things better, and there is such a thing as it being too late.

Last night I sat and talked to a man that knew both of us, long ago. He predicted my path then, in a way that you wouldn't expect from a man with a wild beard, tattoo's and burn marks on his arms. His outward appearance is intimidating to most, but he's the sort that will break up a fight when it happens near him, not participate. He's calm and collect in situations that prove he's confident enough to not validate himself by overcoming other people, but rather by making them at peace with himself. 

"You and I are the same", he said, not meaning that we reacted the same in every situation, but that we've come from the same places, encountered people's preconceived notions and grown into our selves in such a way that when we look back on every situation, we'll do so with pride in how we handles it. 

He's giving to a fault, willing to accept a lot from people and forgive them for it. He doesn't preach to you about what you should do, but rather uses his own life as an example, letting you connect the dots in your head and take away from it what you need to see.

 

It’s getting warm outside now, and humid. I go for a walk in the afternoon and enjoy the fact that miles feel like blocks with the constant, unimaginable scenery that pulls me forward. 

I’m undressing in the stairs before I’m all the way inside my attic apartment. I sit in the cool dark after hanging up my clothes and listen to the calliope or the bells of the cathedral catching my breath, knowing I’ll have to walk further and faster every day just so I can keep having moments like this one.

I’ve been torn recently, about whether to stay, or to go. I don’t know what it is that I’m looking for, which is unusual for me; I’m a man of action, a plan always in motion. My time to decide is drawing to a close though and I’ve been going back and forth about what I want and what I should do. Where I should be.I was out last night and ran into one of the models that I’ve worked with during my time here. We talked for a short while and I walked her home when we both left at the same time. She asked how longer I’d be here for and when I told her I might be leaving soon, she said “i hope you stay” and suddenly, so did I.

She called at just before two in the morning, which happened to come at the moment when I’d finally agreed to venture over to a friends house and let him cook for me (he invites me often on late nights, and i’ve always felt bad for not accepting). We sat at his kitchen counter, eating and talking; she was actually the topic of the moment.

She sobbed into the phone; she was lonely she said. She didn’t have the friends she’d imagined she would when she moved away. She didn’t know how hard it was, doing everything on her own. She didn’t know that she’d actually miss me like this when she was gone, and she was sorry (for everything).

As soon as I hung up the phone, my friend nodded and said “thanks for stopping by. I’m sorry my friend, truly.”, and I left with heartfelt apologies and plans to meet up the next day (today).

I feel heartless when i speak to her, because to me, it isn’t enough.