Always Relying

[Yeah, I know I was supposed to comment about what everyone can't stop talking about: Reagan, D-day, the Tonys, and whatever else occupied the nation's attention over the weekend. Instead, let me tell you about Friday, and why you can't always go by first impressions.]

[There's that feeling when you think you know it's going to be a crappy day, and you think maybe it would've been better to stay in your studio apartment with your comforter and your Douglas Coupland novels and your Trader Joe's snacky-snacks. I certainly felt that way after Friday morning's bus ride to Bar review at Fort Mason.]

[Our Hero boards the 47 Van Ness bus, double mocha in one hand, worn (not warm) leatherette bag slung over shoulder, and sits near the front. Opposite him sits an Old Man, carrying a 60s vintage briefcase and dressed Shabby Casual - there may have been a Members Only jacket and a canvas fishing hat. Our Hero is wearing an old blue T-shirt advertising the 1999 AIDS Walk. The shirt holds little Meaning for him anymore (he'd a had a pretty miserable time during that one and only experience with the Walk: a hot, muggy, forced march through Golden Gate Park crowded with too many sanctimonious people); it's really just a blue T-shirt.]

[OLD MAN (giving Our Hero a fishy eye): You do that AIDS Walk?]

[OUR HERO: Mm-hmm.]

[O.M. (muttering, after a pause): Y'know, I got a cure for AIDS.]

[O.H. (against his better judgment): Oh?]

[O.M. (sotto voce hiss): Castration.]

[Our Hero, immediately knowing the correct response was "Oh, and what do you suggest we do about senile bigoted assholes who haven't had a new thought or an unobstructed bowel movement since Eisenhower's first term?" instead gets up and moves to the back of the bus.]

[Well, with a start like that, I thought I knew what kind of day it would be. BUT...but but but...it wasn't! First, a young woman in my class takes me aside after that day's torture session and offers me the use of her laptop for the Bar exam. Her gist: "I know we don't really know each other, but since I heard you say last week you're in a fix because the Bar doesn't allow you to take the exam on a Mac, I've been thinking 'he seems like a nice, trustworthy guy, and I'm not using my new Dell, so...why not?'" She drove me over to her apartment, handed me the Dell, and we talked for a good spell. I mean...Kindness of Strangers jackpot, n'est-ce pas?]

[The rest of the afternoon wasn't all that pleasant, as I discovered I'd missed the deadline to download the special exam-taking software the Bar quite sensibly requires us to use, and spent hours getting nowhere with several 800 numbers. (That battle is still in progress.) Work that night at the Friendly Neighborhood Cabaret went off like a dream, and later...]

[Well, later, I met someone else who was a pleasant surprise considering the circumstances, which give rise to crazy jerkos more often than not. As the dawn's rosy fingers tickled the D.T. Apt.'s venetian blinds many hours later, and other fingers tickled NeverYouMind, I had a feeling I might have hit the Kindness of Strangers jackpot twice in 24 hours.]

[La Blanche, c'est moi. I know way too many people a lot more shy of their 35th birthday than I am who remain cynical of such a phenomenon; Tennessee Williams obviously was. Not me!]

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