larry david moment: the metra station friendly stranger.

Yeah. I am a Seinfeld fan. I often give the name Elaine Benes when making reservations, and my vocabulary is full of words/statements that are from Seinfeld and Curb your Enthusiasm. I could have written an episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm with my thought process/actions yesterday…so I thought I would share. Some think it is funny, some think it is pathetic. Either way, it is very much something I could see Larry David going through and to me, that is funny.

To start off this fiasco, some background information: I often take the train to downtown. I have to pay for parking ($1.00 for 24 hours). One day, about two months ago, I was running late, short on change so I grabbed what I had…two quarters, four dimes, and two nickels. Every morning is the same. I sleep late, run around like crazy, Amy gets frustrated and “kindly” reminds me that I could get up earlier and buy a parking card (swipe the card every morning at the parking meter instead of finding change everywhere possible…like her wallet), and then I run out the door, use the turbo in my car for about a mile, jump out of the car, run to the parking meter as the train gates are going down, throw my change in (I have developed a process of inserting the coins into the parking meter as fast as possible ( I have missed trains because the idiot in front of me is paying with all nickels, or decides to take their sweet time)), and jump on the train as the doors close.

Ok. So about two months ago. I get to the parking meter, throw in four quarters as fast as possible, but this time it was too fast. My last quarter did not register…and I have 2 people behind me waiting to put in their change. You cannot press any button to return your change, the only option is to put in more change so it will register, then the next person can put their change in. My thoughts race. I do not like to hold people up, but I have no extra change on me, and the gates are coming down. I turn around and a certain friendly stranger asks me what the problem is. I told her the situation and she gave me a quarter. In return I gave her a Susan B. Anthony and a “Thank You”. Now, I did not notice what she looked like…I mostly focused on not missing my train, but I remember this person being a female with dark-ish hair…that is it.

For the last few weeks, I have randomly seen someone who I had originally thought was the friendly stranger that helped me out. We road the same train home and I would see her when we would get off the train. She always smiled and said hello, and I would do the same…because I thought she was the one who helped me out.

Yesterday… Yesterday I got off the train and walked home. I saw this same person, and I saw her walking in the same direction I was going. Now, I appreciated the quarter in the time of need, but I thought to myself…I really do not want to “chat” with anyone as I am walking home. I kicked it in high gear, went throw some parking lots, and got just enough ahead of her, and without looking at her so that I would have to waive or have a “stop and chat”. I could hear her behind me, but I thought I would lose her as I made my turn. Nope…I could still hear her behind me. “Odd” I thought. Next thing I know, my awesome neighbor sees me walking and offers to drive me home the rest of the way. I got in the car. I thought that was going to be it with this friendly stranger. Wrong.

I had to take Triscuit for a walk, so I got her ready and we turned out of the driveway…when who would have guessed, this friendly stranger was turning in…she is apparently my neighbor. Of course I feel like an idiot. This was not the person who gave me change, this is someone I should have recognized right away because we live next to each other. Of course when I passed her in the driveway, I had to open my mouth and say “Oh you are my neighbor” letting her know I had no idea who she was. Now I feel like a super idiot, and I start planning on taking another train to avoid the possible walk home talking to her…and I tell Amy about this whole fiasco. She thinks I am a joke…then tells me she is the neighbor that drives the white car and parks it out on the street. Now I really do not want to have anything to do with her. 😉 I was hoping at least she was the one with the BMW so we could talk about cars, if we ever walked together. Oh well. I know…I am crazy and long winded…but I just got a kick out of the whole situation. Will I switch trains? Will I start talking to her? Or will I continue to uncomfortably avoid? Who knows. Let’s see what she says the next time we see each other.