Be not forgetful to entertain strangers…

I dread social obligations.  I go to parties just for the food.  I have more friends who are dead or in books (or both) than I do in real life.  I am most decidedly an introvert: the few, the proud, the much-misunderstood, the much-maligned.

And yet…

I have this thing for strangers.  Whether we’ve been thrust together for a brief and necessary interaction (e.g. the man bagging my groceries or the teenager who’s checking my tire pressure), or whether we are just in the same place at the same time (the woman who is also in the baking aisle buying molasses, the old gentleman waiting in line beside me at the post office), I defy the social custom that says we should all quietly ignore one another’s existence, or make as little of it as possible.

Sometimes this is awkward.  “Are you making gingerbread, too?” I exclaim to Molasses Lady.  She looks alarmed, mumbles something, and moves away.

But sometimes–and this is why I’m incorrigible–I strike gold.

Today, I ventured out into the sometimes festive, sometimes thoroughly depressing world of Christmas shopping.  When I think of the corporate greed that is trying to take over this sacred season, I get upset and depressed.  But when I look at the worn-out people who are just trying to make a living as they shelve and re-shelve and scan and bag all these heaps of more or less meaningless stuff, my heart goes out to them.  And yep, I feel that urge to strike up a conversation.

Today it was my cashier.  She was about five feet tall, with silver hair, glasses, and a grim expression.  But her name was Henrietta.  I said it silently to myself, loving it.  What a quintessentially English name.  So, with nothing else to go on, I said abruptly, “Your name is so pretty.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Eh.”

“I just like it.  Not one I get to hear very often,” I said a tad sheepishly, feeling like this was going to be another Molasses Lady Moment. But then, gentle reader….

“My mother actually named me after my father.”

“Oh! Henry? I love that name, too!”

“Well, it was World War II, you know, and she didn’t know if she’d ever see him again, so I was Henrietta.”

I thought he had probably died in the war, and unconsciously began to look and feel deep sympathy.

“Well, let me tell you.  When he came home and it was Henry and Henrietta, it got old real fast!”

I laughed.  She kept going.

“So I started going by just Etta–”

“Do you still go by Etta?” I interrupted.

“Oh, yes, everywhere but here.  In fact, when I filled out my application there was a line for “preferred name” and I was all excited, but then when they printed my name tag, there it was!”

I laughed, “Your whole name after all!”

“Oh, no no.  I swear, my mother must have thought I was going to grow up to be twelve feet tall.  Because my whole name, my actual given name is HenriettaMarie, no spaces.”

“Oh my goodness!”

“Yep, and then my dad wanted to name me after my mother since I was named after him, so I became HenriettaMarie Margaret.”

I was grinning in amazement. “So in Kindergarten did you have to write out HenriettaMarie?”

“Oh, yes!  And add Wiecsowski to the end it was a real winner!

I laughed and laughed.

“As you can see, I never really grew into it,” she chuckled.  (She was a tiny lady.)

“So you rebelled and shortened it to just four little letters!”

“I did,” she said, her eyes sparkling.

And then, alas, we had dragged out the cashier/customer duties as long as possible and I had to move on and let the person behind me have her turn.  I picked up my things.

“Thank you! Merry Christmas, Etta!”

She stopped and looked at me, “My, it’s…nice to hear that.”

We exchanged one more smile and I went out the door.

So maybe it’s because I spent one very lonely Christmas working retail myself (including Christmas Day itself–who goes shopping ON Christmas??), or maybe it’s because A Christmas Carol is on my mind, in which good old Fred declares that Chistmastime is “the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys,” but I don’t plan on giving up my alarming habit anytime soon.

And maybe if you read this, Molasses Lady, you’ll understand that I wasn’t trying to steal your baking ingredients or even pry into your personal life, honestly.  I just saw us as fellow-passengers to the kitchen, and as such I regard you as a comrade, a friend–a human being worthy of my notice, my regard, and yes, my love.

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