requiem

Nobody knows where I am. I live alone, I'm single, and, unless I'm at work or with friends, literally, nobody knows where I am. It's quite often that I'll just hop in the car and disappear out into the world. One of these days I'm going to get on an airplane and fly to some random place for the weekend. Chicago maybe. Or perhaps Milwaukee. This sort of freedom is great, but it has at least one major drawback: I can only get away with nobody knowing where I am if nobody has any expectations of me. Not only is there nobody at home who depends on me (someday I'll decide that this fact means that my life is incomplete) but even the people I encounter when I'm out there in the world have no expectations as to what I do, say, or how I look. People are too quick to forgive me my mistakes, give me a break, and allow me the benefit of the doubt. Just last night I bought an ice-cream cone. The guy at Ben and Jerry's handed the cone to me, so I had only one had to work with when paying the $2.25. With my free hand, I pulled out my wallet and gave him two dollars. I put my wallet away and before I could even get my hand in my pocket to rummage around for the quarter I knew was floating around in there, the guy said "I think I have the 25 cents." Why is everybody so nice? I'm not that cute, and I hope I don't look that helpless. Maybe I should find a choir to sing in. At least choral directors, dictators that they are, have some standards and expectations.

Oh shit! An idea just came to me. Maybe people seem nice because I have no expectations of THEM! Or if I do, maybe I assume the worst and am surprised when people are better than that. I must now go away and think about this...