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Health & Fitness

The Stranger I Met Today

Ghosts, Phil Collins, and awkward conversations. Yeah, that was my Saturday night.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to go to that concert with you?” my friend, Nina, asked me while we were waiting for our haunted house tour group to assemble. “I don’t want you to have to go by yourself. People don’t just go to concerts by themselves,” she said, gesturing her hands in dissatisfaction. Nina always has an opinion and she’s always generous with sharing it. 

“It will be fine. I’m not going to expect someone pay for tickets to go see someone perform that they don’t even like, just so I have a friend to sit next to. It’s no big deal. Haven’t you ever gone to see a movie or concert by yourself?” I asked her. I already knew the answer, though. She shook her head. 

“I wouldn’t mind going with you,” she insisted. 

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“Nina, I already bought my ticket. I appreciate the offer, but I’m good. I don’t want anyone to go that doesn’t want to go.” 

After a minute, she said, “I suppose you’re right. An old friend insisted that I see Phil Collins with her once and that was horrible,” Nina said. She shook her head again. “Not a good time.” 

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“Even if you’re not a Phil Collins fan, I would assume that he’s a great showman anyway, right. Nothing good about that show at all?”

“No. Nothing. I mean, it was Phil Collins,” she said, as though I should have known this already. “This will probably be more thrilling,” Nina said as she motioned to the other people around the room. As she said this, a small group of kids started shrieking and pointing at the window. One little girl yelled out, “It’s a ghost, it’s a ghost!” 

A man had been standing no more than five feet away, examining some drawings of a ship. I thought he was moving towards us to steer clear of the giggling children. Instead, he looked right at Nina and said, “Phil Collins. I’ve seen him too.” He then asked Nina where she saw Phil Collins perform. Before she could even answer, he spoke again. “What a fantastic show. Everyone should see Phil Collins, you know. He puts on a helluva show, a hell-u-va show. Just a true artist.” Nina said nothing and I decided to step in, telling him that I still had not yet been blessed with a Collins experience. 

“Well, you should. It’s nice to meet other fans,” he said. There was long pause, while Nina said nothing, the man tried to figure out what to say next, and I just stood there smiling. Thankfully, the tour guide called out to the room, instructing us to assemble for the tour. 

Lesson Learned

If you’re going to invite yourself into a conversation, when your intention is to successfully join and remain in the conversation, be sure to listen to whole thing.  If this man had tuned in for our entire exchange and changed his approach, he may have had acquired some buddies to walk next to on the haunted house tour. But, because he only paid attention to a snippet, his intention to befriend Nina failed miserably. It’s a shame; there were no new friendships formed in the air that night. 

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