Today I took a strange blind woman on a shopping trip.
Now, I hadn't met this woman at any previous time in my life. Even now, I don't know her last name. Her first name was Evelyn. As I stood perched on the corner of 6th and 21st, humming to myself, Evelyn hovered to my right. Walking stick in hand, moppy dark hair and all-black outfit, she apparently heard me humming loudly to myself (as I always do) and put her hand on my arm to get my attention. I looked over. She was middle-aged, Asian, and seemingly blind. Her eyes were closed tight.
Evelyn asked me if I could help her find TJ Maxx. I said, "Well actually, I'm on my way there right now, so we could go together if you like." And go together we did. We couldn't have spent more than half an hour together, and over that course of time she learned everything about me, and I nothing about her. She asked me about my school, my family, my plans for the future. She suggested I join a church choir as a networking tool.
At TJ Maxx, we boarded two escalators, walked through automatic doors, and located the "pants" section. There, she asked me to read to her several of the prices from the pants in her size. I did, and she determined that she didn't have that much money to spend on pants. She asked me if there were fitting rooms; there were. And we de-escalated back out of TJ Maxx. Evelyn said goodbye, turned around, and walked back uptown. I checked my bag for my wallet and phone. They remained intact.
And the moral of this story is: I need to get a check on my destructive humming habit.
