Being my own company opens an added awareness of others, aka eavesdropping and a seeming propensity for attracting conversations with 30-40 year old men...
My perspective as a stranger:
On my interview trip to Co Spr. I met a man who owns a fireworks company, traveling to Seattle for a firework convention. We chatted about chemistry a bit, the colors different metal combustion reactions created, he offered his card and an invitation to meet up while he was in Seattle.
Traveling with my parents in Colorado a man stuck up a conversation with me. He owns a plumbing/piping business that his mothers ex-husband trained him in. He didn't know what he was going to do with his life, plumbing seemed to fit well enough, and someone was willing to teach him, he was happy. "who was that guy?" my family asks, "A nice guy who owns a plumbing business."
Today, the woman sitting a couple tables away from me told her friend the story about how her son had a seizure. He stopped breathing. She was there, on the side of the road, giving her son chest compressions. About 10 compressions in, he gasped and started breathing again...medications, bodies malfunctioning, brain connections lapsing in their duties. My life feels easy.
5 middle aged women sat one table over, large glasses of red wine, chocolate cake split between them; talk about the primaries, bitching about their husbands, about hair dryers, about facelifts. Only one woman said, my husband is wonderful...is this how it is? only 1 out of 5 really happy?
A man with a mac and an "artists" go-tee, sitting one table over, playing music in a coffee shop, (I find it annoying when people play their own music in coffee shops without head phones). He strikes up a conversation, "what do you teach"? "human impacts on biogeochemical cycles"... many people aren't totally sure where to go from there... (ok dude) "what do you do?" he runs/organizes? a non-profit organization on leadership and international *insert string of buzz words that don't really go anywhere* and hes written a book. "oh, nice" I'm still trying to process what exactly this non-profit is about, after about 15 seconds I decide is possibly not about anything...I don't ask about the book. He asks about the class. I tell him chemistry, Carbon cycle, etc. "so things like global warming and shifts in the magnetic field" ... anytime someone relates shifts in the magnetic field to human activities, its a red flag...then he asks if we study anything like chemo*insert crazy theory term, maybe having to do with crystals here*. Nope, just basic Chemistry. Well, have a nice night (dude).
Colorado College climbing gym,I chat with a girl on Women's Wednesday; ask her what year she is (a freshman), what she is studying (no idea- my favorite answer :) ). Then she asks "how old are you, I MEAN what year are you?" It was hilarious. I explain I'm co-teaching a class, "oooooh that makes more sense...I was thinking 6th year senior or something". grad students and 25 year olds are an anomaly at CC, most people, professors and students, are a little unsure of which one I am.
Jackson, WY; sitting with the locals who run the cafe at Tieton ski resort, talking with a guy about life, and only 1 beer in, hes telling me his life story, telling things people at the table who have known him for much longer than my 30min interaction, have never heard. It all felt so real. All of Jackson, my friend, and her happy, content and healthy relationship with her boyfriend, their small one bedroom cabin, heated by a wood burning stove; the story of his first successful elk hunt while eating elk meatballs we had cooked up. Pure goodness.
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