The People She Meets

Sometimes I'm afraid for my mother to leave her house. She seems to have some kind of magnet that attracts all the Crazies in the world. Most are harmless, I suppose, but why do they always pick her to talk to?

In the past, she's been accosted by a dwarf who asked her on a date while she was shopping for wrapping paper at the store. He got irate when she said she was already involved with someone and was irked because she wasn't wearing a ring. On another occasion, a woman who came to her yard sale started detailing her marital and drinking problems, then asked my mother if she had any earrings. (It was bizarre, but you had to be there.)

When she was walking down a street in San Francisco, a man came up to her and said, "Na-nu, Na-nu," and yes -- he was doing the Na-nu Na-nu hand gesture, too.

A few months ago, she had a lonely man approach her at a gas station with the corny line, "I think you dropped something." When she looked confused, he followed up with: "Your smile." She then did smile. I wouldn't have. I'm not as approachable as she is.

So it should have come as no surprise (except how could we not be surprised when these weird things happen?) when a man approached her at Wal-mart today, claiming that he "invented" taking shopping carts apart when they're stuck together. And though he invented it, now "everyone is copying him." I hope to God he was joking. But I doubt it. He even demonstrated it for her and explained the mechanics. This was just another weird person telling his story to my mother. I don't know how she finds them, but it seems they always find her.