I met my neighbor the other night. His name is Jeremy. However, in his lovely Southern drawl, it came out Jer-a-mee. Jeremy was standing perched halfway between his living room and porch. I was struggling to hold onto Bartleby’s leash and get out the front door with a bag of garbage and a few empty boxes. Jeremy looked at me with a wide-eyed paranoia and said, “I’m not sure you should go out there. There have been cops circling around. And did you hear the helicopter? It was circlin’, shinin it’s light all over the place.” I said, “Oh, a ghetto copter.” I was just going to walk away when I thought it best to consider my new surroundings. I asked, “Is that unusual?” As earnestly as I have ever heard and his eyes widening even more, he said, “I have never seen that before in my life.” My response, “Oh. I just moved here from LA. Someone was murdered four blocks away from my house. And I lived in a good neighborhood. So…” I peaked in and saw Jeremy’s red suede couches as he said with a twinge of sadness and resignation, “I’ve been to LA. I love it there.” Yes, WEHO is fun.
I have now taken Bartleby on three “hikes”. I don’t think there is a path in the city that is not paved, but I am determined to find it. When we were “hiking” today and I was carrying his poop for two miles, AGAIN, I started to notice something that is really odd to me. Everyone waves at me. Not just a friendly, “Oh hey neighbor” kind of wave. Rather, a make eye contact, smile, enthusiastically wave at you and if I am in a car I will definitely honk. It is really strange. Not that I don’t appreciate the welcome, but I am pretty sure that I have never met any of these people. And I have taken to responding with an obligatory wave without all the smiling and eye contact. This creates a bit of a problem. What happens when I actually meet people who actually see me out and about and they wave and I shine them with my half-assed “I guess?” wave? What happens then, people? I’ll tell you what happens. I become the bitch from LA. Sad day. Sad, sad day.
This entry is basically a sociology paper. 1) Pretty snappy judgment, miss LA, with your lovely southern drawl, your red suede couches, and your WEHO. 2) we TRIED to warn you: people in the south are friendly, in an I-actually-care-about-you kind of way. They're givin' out eye contact like it's candy.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Grant. It's that genuine aspect of the hello that is really throwing you off.
ReplyDeleteIt's not just a "hello". They honk at me when I walk the dog. It is not just an obligatory wave, it is a wave of genuine recognition. I have asked natives and it doesn't happen to them. Swear. And my neighbor is gay, no matter what snappy judgment Grant says I made.
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