"Oh, not much.." he began. Adjusting his glasses to see me better. You shudda seen the look on Julia's face. It was half, "are-we-seriously-gonna-go-talk-to-this-guy?" and half "I-love-watching-J-talk-to-strangers-anyways, so-this-could-be-fun."
I soon found myself walking over to speak with the man, for no reason other than just to see what this guy was all about. I mean, here's this old dude chillin by a closed Robin's donuts, just enjoying the night. Call me curious, (or weird, I don't care) but the idea of having a full 5 to 8 minute conversation with a total stranger always excited me.
We chatted about everything and nothing at the same time. Through our short convo, I learned that he retired in his home town in Winnipeg 15 years before, and only recently pulled himself out of retirement because he was bored. He made it very clear (almost adamant) that he loved his current job serving coffee and donuts by the peer. It was nice to see. He did tell me his name, but for the life of me I can't seem to remember it. So, chill old guy from Robin's Donuts in Gimli, Manitoba. If you're reading this, know that you're good people...and I'm sorry I forgot your name. As time went on, he professed his love for Gimli about 3 times. This drew me to do the same, being that only months before I had proposed to Julia and the far end of the same pier we stood by. Julia would never admit it, but she always blushes when I bring that up with total strangers. (Yeah, pretty sure it wasn't the first time)
We said our goodbye's and Julia and I walked on. Then it hit me. I always talk to strangers like that for the first and only time, all the time. Almost daily. Julia even told me once that its one of her favorite qualities about me. So right then and there, I found my blog idea! I'm gonna blog about every stranger I come across. I have come by some pretty cool people in the past, and learned a lot about them by doing just that. I mean, even this afternoon, I learned that the DHL courier used to play a lot of soccer and would out run people 20 years his junior when he used to play. All just by me looking at the "Manchester United" logo that was sewn on to the left chest of his uniform. (Well, there's more to it than that. While pointing to his shirt, I asked him if he "Fancied" the Man-U team in a fake English accent. That's actually how the conversation started.) He was delivering a package to the house, man! Gotta break the ice some how, right?
My point is, there is an entire world of people out there. People with experiences that I'm pretty sure we can learn from, laugh at (or with), and gain insight. Somebody's just gotta start the convo, man. Through out this blog, I will document all of those experiences, and if the people are willing, I will provide photos with each post. So that's it. I plan to do this once a week, but document every stranger I talk to in between blogs on paper so I can tell u all about them.
This blog is dedicated to God who gave me the heart to love people, and to my fiancee Julia who always encouraged me to write something since our second date.
World, I hope you like what I put here....
J
"If you love people with a genuine heart, they will come to you."
-Rev. T.D. Jakes
