Be Careful What You Wear

Chi thinks I’m cute when I wear my white running hat. Today when I threatened to wear it she joked that I was going to get hit on. However, it was windy so I left it at home.

Walking through the local park to start my run a guy walks by me and says something just above a whisper. I think he’s asking for directions so I stop to let him repeat himself. What he is actually asking is if I ‘want to have sex with a black’ - he being ‘the black’. I’m a bit taken back. So he tries a toned down version in English, asking if I ‘want to make love with him.’ I kind of look at him sideways with a few sarcastic things coming to mind but decide to say nothing and continue walking.

Now I had my entire run to think about this odd - at least for me - experience. Was this guy so desperate that throwing this phrase out in public was worth the effort? Be that as it may, I realized that I was strolling through a public park alone in November wearing running shorts and eating a banana. So maybe his efforts were more justified than I thought.

As usual I spent much of my run thinking how I would say certain phrases in French. I found myself using the formal form of ‘you’ when practicing my responses to the proposition. But if these matters aren’t considered familiar, then what is?

So in the end Chi was right – I got hit on. Of course it had been implied that this attention would have been the female variety.