when you least expect it

i love boston because of the people i meet here. tonight, after an exhausting shift full of more "my life is hopeless" conversations with teenagers (i think i've had one of those with almost all of the kids at my school in the last few weeks)i settled onto my familiar bench in my familiar bus station in harvard square, to wait for my familiar bus. as usual, i am too tired to read from my "introduction to therapeutic counseling" textbook, too tired to do anything else but slouch and wait for my bus. like many other nights, a guy came and sat next to me. but this guy was different.

we started talking because he thought he smashed his new CD when he sat down, and i was being my polite, friendly, oregonian self and helping him assess the damage. suddenly we were like old friends, chatting and laughing, the words coming easily. i forgot that i was waiting for the bus, forgot that i hadn't known this guy five minutes before. i told i really wanted a bike but i was too poor so i needed a free one and i didn't care what kind it was or what it looked like as long as it was functional. we got on the bus together, still chatting, and he sat down near me and said, "i'm going to find you a bike."

"come sit by me," i said, because it was ridiculous to pretend that we didn't want to be sitting together, talking. so he did. and he asked me the question he asks every one he meets from oregon, something about walking by rivers and finding turquoise. i asked if he had a question for people from every state and he said he thought he did, and i said, "ohio." and sure enough, he had a question and a great, quirky story to go with it. he was asking me to meet him for coffee before he was asking my name, and we shook hands.

"my stop is coming up" i said, and he said, "so is mine." and then we discovered we had the same stop (he said his first, so that elevated my fears of creepiness) and we both laughed because this whole thing was just so crazy, and we got off the bus together and talked and laughed and gave each other nicknames even though we'd just met. and we exchanged numbers and made plans to go see the band who's CD he thought he'd broken when he sat down next to me in the first place.

"wicked nice meeting you" he said, in true boston fashion. "i'm going to find you a bike, liz."

i walked down my street, trying to figure out if i was awake or dreaming. who knows, maybe he's crazy, or gay, or an atheist, but he's super fun and our meeting was so serendipitous. things like this don't happen every day, or every year for that matter. at the very least, it's certainly worth documenting. and at the most? we shall see.