1998-09-25
I was walking around at the University of Guelph yesterday, enjoying the wind and sun, and the crackling of dry leaves, when a young woman appeared on the cobblestone walkway coming towards me. She was wearing dark, tight jeans, and a black shirt open to just about where I like it, and she was carrying a backpack. She was walking alone. And a number of things about her made the day a little less unremarkable.
1. the cheerful way she walked, though she was carrying a heavy pack
2. the way her hips swayed slightly, gracefully; the way of a woman who walks confidently, but not without a sense of style. What I'm trying to get at here is how unshowy yet mesmerizing her walk was. Smooth and graceful.
3. she was partly business-- shoulder-length hair, pulled back, just a little make-up--and partly show--little silver earrings that I couldn't quite make out, and the generous display of neck.
4. she looked directly at me as she walked by and smiled and said "hi".
It was the "hi" finally, that tingled. College students! Some strange guy appears from nowhere, right in your path, so, of all things, you say hi, hello, good evening, who are you? Her face was entirely free of parochial suspicion or feminist contempt. She looked directly at me and acknowledged that I had entered her carefree orbit.
I, who normally spend most of my time with adults or employees or whathaveyou, was slightly taken aback. I don't spend enough time at college campuses, obviously. I walk past dozens, maybe hundreds of people every day. No one greets you, least of all with a guileless smile and cheerful "hi", unless, perhaps, if you are directly in their way, or they're trying to sell you something.
Hi, she said. Who are you? Do I know you? Should I know you? Are you a person I will come to know? There are possibilities here and I am listing a million of them with two letters: h-i. Hi. Hello. I see your eyes, do you see mine? We are facing each other. You are looking at my body. Do you like how I dress? I have the energy to stride down this walkway with confidence and purpose-- I am going somewhere, but I see you facing me, not directly in my path, but you are there, and I am telling you that I recognize another human being who may have a million possible adventures tomorrow and I have a little smile on my face because I, too, might have a million adventures tomorrow, and for one second, I am telling you that your adventures are mine, and my adventures are yours.
Hi, I can't stop, I have to go, and I don't know you, so I won't stop, but it is possible to know me, and it is possible to know you, and there's a lot I can tell you about myself with my two letters and my stride and the way my jeans make me feel like I am sleek and purposeful, protected but free, as if these are the kind of jeans that I can slip out of in two seconds if you took my two letters and built cathedrals out of them some evening when, after my "hi", you said "hi, what's your name", and I told you. And I might tell you because when I see you in my path the only thing I can think of to say to you, a perfect stranger, is "hi", leaving open all the infinite possibilities of you saying "hello... what's your name?"
And in a few seconds she was past me, looking ahead again, thinking ahead, perhaps about the person she is going to meet, or the room she is headed for, the comfort, the envelope of arranged bed and sheets and tooth brush and over-sized t-shirt, and a moment of wonder, perhaps, about the possibilities of people she might or might not know.
I've been thinking about this all night. I am obsessed with a question. If I had said, "Hi. What's your name?" Would that have changed things? Maybe she would have laughed for the sudden improbability of the question coming from a passing stranger, and answered "why?" or "I don't give out my name to strangers", but maybe she would have laughed and answered reflexively, using her good manners, and then said, "Why?". Or maybe she would have laughed and looked away quickly and walked on, and everything would once again resemble "real" life, which is what we call that phony groveling most of us offer as an excuse for social life nowadays. And maybe she would have looked away quickly, a little frightened, alarmed, or nervous.
Maybe she would have called the campus police: "He asked me my name!"
If I could do the moment over again, I would ask her name. I'd say "hi", the same way I did say "hi", but this time, quickly, "Excuse me-- what's your name?" and put on my friendliest possible face. And if she gave me her name, her Ann or Lisa or Renee or June or Tara or Katarina or Natasha or Mary or Maryanne or Elizabeth or Roxanne, then I would say, "I just wanted to say that your walk and your face and your 'hi' have added a halo to this evening. I'll bet you don't know how beautiful you are. I just wanted to tell you that." But I would not tell her how much it aches just to watch her walk by.
Well, that's my Monday morning thought. I think I'll go back to sleep at my desk now.
© Copyright 1998 Bill Van Dyk