A Long, Pointless Story About Unpleasant Encounters That Takes Place On A Sunday Which, For Some Reason, I Remember As A Decidedly Pleasant Day

On Sunday the bus was so crowded that I had to stand pressed against strangers. Each of us vied for space on the overhead pole that passengers grab to avoid falling. The bus windows were all steamed up. Everyone wore too many layers.

The bus lurched to a stop and while I fought to steady myself, three young men boarded. Most adults are careful to leave a certain amount of space, but the guy who wedged in next to me must have been from one of those rude, crowded countries where surgeons still smoke on the job. Every time his hand bumped up against mine on the pole I moved back a little, and that's how, inch-by-inch, I managed to slide my hands through several colonies of deadly bacterium. I eventually wound up in the rear stairwell, the germiest spot on the bus, because every passenger, whose hands have been god-knows-where, touches the bus pole as they pass it. So I was in the stairwell, thinking about germs, when for the benefit of his friends, my companion launched into a story.

The story was about a homeless man he'd seen standing on a street corner. At the man's feet was an old black lab, its head on its paws. The homeless man was holding some kind of melon. Shifting the melon in his arms, the homeless man called, "Lucy!" and the old dog got up on its feet and wagged its tail, looking up at the man in (I imagined) that friendly, inquisitive way so particular to old Labs. The man lifted the melon high and then heaved it down, breaking it over the dog's head. "And you should have seen the look on that dog's face," my companion said to his friends, shifting his hand tighter against mine, and they had a good laugh.

"That," I said, "is a horrible story." The bus came to a stop and I exited, wiping my hands on my jeans.

* * *

Since it was Sunday and since I had some time to kill, I decided to get lunch at the first restaurant I found, regardless of how unpleasant the food might seem. That's how I happened on this tiny eatery. Or rather, it looked tiny from the outside because the storefront was narrow, with a low awning above it. But on the inside the place was vast, with tables set up way in the back, each separated from the others by woven grass screens so the whole joint seemed like an enormous room, accommodating a number of smaller rooms.



According to the menu, which had a map of Ethiopia on it (a roundish, landlocked country with a point protruding on its Eastern border) the food was from, Guess Where?! So I opened up the menu and then realized I didn't know what to ask for. I finally chose a combination dish, and in under five minutes, two plates of food arrived. One was draped with a large, spongy crepe heaped with several goopy piles of stew. On the other plate rested a plain crepe, folded into quarters like a napkin.

"Do you know how to eat this?" the waiter said, and that's when I noticed I didn't have silverware.

I said, "well, I'm not sure," because though I figured I knew what to do, you never can be sure about anything.

"You rip off a piece of the bread," he said, indicating the folded-up pancake, "and you make a big mess." Then he produced a fork, wrapped in a paper towel, and he laid it gently at the far end of my table. "We don't use this," he said. Which, I wasn't about to eat with a fork like some kind of paranoid and judgmental American — though to be fair, I kept thinking about my hands, all germy from the bus pole, due to the young men from their crowded little country of rude hand-contact.

And in that moment-of-weighing-things-out I was reminded of this horrible date I once went on. We were to meet at this restaurant in sixteenth street. "It's great," my date said, "and only six bucks for a meal. One plate is enough for two people, so we can split it." On the night of our date I was ten minutes late because I'd had trouble parking, and when I arrived he was already seated. On the table was a big plate of dips and salads, a basket of pita bread, and a dispenser of paper napkins. I sat down and said hi, and we talked for a bit, and then my date tucked a napkin under his chin, which I took as a signal to begin eating. I was starving from the stress of finding a parking spot, and I was just about to reach for the bread when he said, "I don't know about you, but before I eat I always thoroughly wash my hands." Then he gave me very precise instructions on how to wash carefully — not just my palms, but between my fingers, paying special attention to the cuticle area.

Now, in the Ethiopian place I'd just found, thinking back on this date that had begun and ended so badly, I left my food and headed way to the back of the deep restaurant, past the Ethiopian family who I guess owned the place — a small child, a teenager, a middle-aged couple, and an old man, all sitting around a table — and I found the ladies' room. But when I pushed open the door, sitting on the toilet was an old Ethiopian woman, dressed all in white with a white headdress, her head in her hands. "Sorry!" I said, and I backed up and shut the door before she lifted her head and saw me.