On our walk home from daycare (me pushing Baby Girl in the stroller, with Brown Chihuahua in tow), we were stopped by a guy who had just parked his car. He was nicely dressed, and paused to tell me that he was a Penn Stater also. I've been told this will happen all over the world, so I'll try to keep you updated on my random happenings with other Penn State Alumni.
Well, said guy was very polite and friendly, so we chatted a bit about when we graduated, our degrees and so on. Then we parted ways.
Nothing special, aside from the act of simply taking the time to chat with a stranger. I miss that.
Here in Berkeley I've been constantly warned to curb my natural desire to say "hello" to strangers, because there are so many that are unsuspectingly imbalanced. I've already been shouted at, cursed at, routinely accosted for money, and had a woman follow Baby Girl and I several blocks as she repeatedly tried to get a closer look into the stroller. Downtown Berkeley has a lot of culture, stores, restaurants, and is close to campus, but it is not somewhere I want to settle down. I get discouraged and lonely sometimes. But today was a nice reminder that it's okay to be friendly to strangers.
Maybe I'll wear my Penn State sweatshirt more often.
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