CRS
Chandler, Arizona, United States

There's an old saying. If you don't want someone to join a crowd, you ask them, "If everyone were jumping off of a cliff, would you?" Well, I have. So my answer would be "Yes". True story.
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I Don't Like Making Chicks Uncomfortable, I Just Wanna Walk Home

Friday, June 20, 2008

this entry brought to you by portishead, "small"


We don't have a car at the moment, so I had to walk down to Target the other day, which is about a half a mile up the road. I was leaving, and I nearly walked into a girl, or rather, she almost ran into me. When I say "girl", I mean she was a woman, probably in her twenties. She was cute as hell, very Jewish looking, and she was approximately 5'3", even standing in her three inch heels. She was the tiniest, most adorable thing I'd seen in a while.

She blushed and we said our excuse mes, and then she and I walked out the same exit door, and started walking the same direction out onto the sidewalk. I'd assumed that she, being an adult, had a car. Who the hell doesn't have a car, aside from me? It's June, it's Phoenix, and at this point in the morning it was already 100 degrees. Of course she'd be loading into a car and driving off.

We kept walking up the sidewalk, me about five feet behind her, and I went into a Gamestop to see if they had a game Michelle and I had been looking for. I was out of luck, so I went back outside and onto the sidewalk, and further a little bit, I went into a grocery store to pay the electric bill. When I went out again, there was that same girl, a little bit behind me. I smiled at her again, and we continued along our away, again, me assuming that she was going to get into a car and drive off, as we were still in the parking lot.

This part is hard to explain, but just off the lot that we were in, there's a very shallow ditch that goes down about five feet from street level at its deepest, and down there is a puddle of water that, for some reason, never evaporates, even though Phoenix hits 120 degree whether. There are huge bushes around it, and the bushes provide the puddle shade; inside this puddle are fish. Big ones, too. Between five and eight fish that are about five inches in length, and there are about a hundred little ones. Every time I walk by there, I always go behind the bushes to look at the fish, and today was no different. The girl was behind me at this point, and I expected her to go off to her car, wherever she was parked.

I watched my fish for about thirty seconds or so, then came back around the bushes (which were, in fact, so large that you couldn't see me behind them), and I noticed that the girl was still walking along the path, only now she was about ten feet in front of me. Oh my god, I thought to myself. It looks like I went behind the bushes with the specific intent on hiding and coming out behind her. She must be freaked the fuck out. Any girl would. Especially this girl, who was so tiny I could probably pick her up under my arm and take off with her. You know how you hear about vans pulling up, and four guys jumping out, and grabbing somebody in broad daylight, and taking off? You know how you think, god, how does that happen? Well, if you saw this girl, you would instantly say, "Right, so that's how it happens." Because you could do it right now, that's how tiny this girl was.

The truth is, any time I find myself unintentionally following a girl for any length of time, I get really nervous. I'm afraid that they think I'm following them, and I want to say out loud, I'm not doing this on purpose! We just happen to be going the same direction for a length of time! The problem was compounded further by the fact that this girl was tiny, and even at the brisk pace she was walking, I could catch up to her in a steady stride with just a few steps. But I didn't want to speed up to catch up to her and pass her, because I was afraid that a guy twice her size behind her and suddenly speeding up behind her would freak her out-- wouldn't that freak you out? I wanted to walk off the sidewalk and go around her, but I wasn't afforded enough space, and had to wait until much further up the street for that space. But on the other hand, staying a good ten feet behind her so that I didn't feel like I was speeding up on her was itself intimidating, because she might be thinking, why the hell has this guy been behind me for such a long period of time? I didn't want her to think I was trying to scare her or intimidate her, either. She looked over her shoulder a couples times at me and made eye contact, and her face looked pleasant enough, but I kept picturing her grasping a bottle of mace I couldn't see and thinking to herself, "That's right, I see you, you motherfucker, you just go ahead and try something."

But I wasn't trying anything! I wish there was some way I could say to her, "IT'S OKAY! I DON'T WANNA HURT YOU! I JUST DON'T HAVE ENOUGH ROOM TO GO AROUND YOU!" I also wanted to shout, "THERE'S A PUDDLE OVER THERE WITH FISH, THAT'S WHY I WAS BEHIND THOSE BUSHES! I KNOW IT SOUNDS WEIRD, BUT THERE REALLY ARE FISH OVER THERE, AND I WASN'T TRYING TO SNEAK UP BEHIND YOU!"

I know for a fact that girls are usually hyper aware of dudes being behind them, making sure nothing funny happens, and I can't blame them. But what I don't think they know is all the uncomfortable thoughts going through our heads-- well, the heads of guys who aren't total dicks, anyway-- that we really, really, really wish we could do anything to make you more comfortable about the fact that there's a guy twice your size right behind you for a whole city block, but if he did anything to try and get out and front of you so you don't have to watch over your shoulder, you would feel even more uncomfortable because then there'd be a guy running up on you, but then, doing nothing is still going to make you feel creeped the fuck out. It's an uncomfortable situation for all those involved, and this is a case where it sucks to have a penis. If I had boobs and a vagina, there would be very few circumstances where somebody would be freaked out at me following them casually for a city block.
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with love from CRS @ 10:06 AM 

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