I often find myself needing to meet up with strangers for a variety of reasons. I belong to a freecycle group and often people will prefer to meet in a public place rather than at their home. This leads to running around to restaurants, coffee shops, even parks. I always hesitated when I make the arrangements. How will I recognize the person? Will the place we are meeting at be crowded? Will I have to go up to person after person and ask if they are the one I am supposed to meet? If at all possible, I try to make the meeting place public, but also one where it will be easy to find someone waiting for me or for someone to find me.
Once, many years ago, I made arrangements to meet a woman in front of the elementary school where our children attended. She had a number of children and it was her youngest that was in my oldest child’s kindergarten class. She knew everyone at school. I knew no one. We were meeting to plan treats for the first class party of the school year. We spoke on the phone to make the arrangements. When she described herself, she said she had blonde hair. On the day we were to meet, I looked for a blonde lady in front of the school. There were many but none of them appeared to be looking for me or waiting for anyone. Finally, a woman approached me and introduced herself as the same mom I was supposed to meet. I looked at her and although I didn’t say it, I thought to myself, “Blonde hair? since when is THAT blonde hair?” I have black hair. Her hair was just two shades lighter than mine! Blonde hair my butt!
That’s how I learned that it’s not good to rely on people’s self descriptions when you are meeting someone in a public place for the first time.
Tonight I had to run out and meet a woman and her daughter for a writing session for NaNoWriMo. We hadn’t even talked on the phone so I had no idea at all what this woman might look like (although a person’s voice is not a key to their visual appearance, it at least helps to get an idea of the person’s demeanor). In her email, she said to look for a “chunky woman with a younger woman and a laptop, looking very tired.” I was prepared to walk into the coffee shop and have to approach a number of people to see if they were the woman I was to meet. Instead, I walked in and found one table with only men and one table at which I saw a “chunky” woman. She was indeed sitting with a younger woman and there was a laptop between the two of them. I wasn’t sure they looked tired, but I was sure I had the right two women.
I was right. The experience restored my faith in people’s self-descriptions!
So how did the write-in go?
Fine! I only stayed for about 45 minutes but I got caught up with my word count. I wrote about 1,000 in that 45 minutes.
The place we had it at was very nice, too. Very conducive to writing! Cheap coffee, too!
Wow. It’s tough to meet someone you’ve only known online or from a phone call. Sometimes a person can have the sweetest voice, and physically be repulsive.
You’re braver than I am! Meeting strangers that way would cause a serious panic attack.
I always describe what I’ll be wearing. I often meet clients in odd locations, and since many of them are women, I want to be sure they have some idea of whom they’ll be encountering. Although, I’m fairly recognizable by self-description, I think: 5′11″, messy hair, crooked nose, general air of world-weary despair.