People You Meet

After work I hit the gym. 45 min on the treadmill at 6.3mph, a couple of sets of biceps and triceps (but not too much) and then home, as there is a bit of paperwork to do. I pulled into my parking spot as usual, grabbed my slightly sweaty smelling gym bag from the trunk (as usual) and went inside. I stopped to get the paper spam that I invariably get in the mailbox when it’s not the end of the month.


Beside the mailboxes for the apartment is a planting box. Sort of. It’s a shallow gravel and stone filled box perhaps five feet by three feet that used to contain a wide variety of tacky plastic plants. If you didn’t look too carefully it looked only tacky, and not horribly tacky. I say “used” because not that long ago, all the plants were removed. It is still unknown to me if they were removed by their owners or stolen, though I can’t imagine anyone taking such a liking to them as to commit an illegal act and removing them all.


As I collected my mail a man from the building that I hadn’t met before came out of the main doors.


“Good evening,” I said in my chirpiest, isn’t-it-a-wonderful-day voice.


“Haven’t they cleaned that up yet?” he said indicating the “planter”.


“That’s discusting,” he continued gruffly.


“That stinks!” Even more gruffly. “It’s a health hazard.”


“Uh huh,” I replied, now in my oops-can’t-stay-and-talk-have-somewhere-to-be voice, and went upstairs as quickly as I could, to sit down and write about the grumpy old man I met downstairs.

One Comment on “People You Meet”

  1. Hey Arc! That amazes me that you took the time to write about the old cranky guy, heheh.
    Isn’t it amazing how he thought you would actually care about the insane drivel he had to spout. I always have the fear that I will be that old grumpy man, living alone, and spouting angry/crazy statements at passer-bys.