I Want to Talk To You, Kind Of

The girl pushes on a hidden panel on the blonde wood table and electrical plugs appear ready for me to plug in my new iPhone. Across from me an older man sits with his wife and looks like everything I could ever want to be sitting across from at an Apple store. The gentleman's pate is bald but he has managed to grow frizzy white hair down to his shoulders and dons a thick mustache in silver to match. He wears many silver rings on his thick fingers that create a look when combined with the silver medallion necklace that rest against the pearly hairs on his exposed chest. His clothing is in layers, many layers, a low cut tee under an opened colorful flannel button up under an outdoorsy fleece vest and topping it all off with a thinned down Columbia jacket.

He is asking the helpful employee lots of questions, but his questions don’t come without a small yarn about himself. The silver haired man explains that he needs a new phone because, “I left my old phone in a taxi,” takes a beat, “in Spain of all places.” I am slowly falling in love with this masterpiece of a blow hard. The confidence and the swagger this fellow has is awe inspiring; the hair, the ‘stache, the jewelry sparkling, the strength of his voice, this man has character.

The other people in the Apple store are the same old same old, moms with babies in strollers, older women looking for a device to text their grandson using the term “bro” to sound like she knows whats going on with the kids, or like me, a basic lady who just want to listen to music or watch a Master Class without the infernal forever spinning wheel. But not the silver fox, no, he’s getting a new iPhone that will be his travel companion, his confidante, the phone will document his exotic trips to Spain where he rides around in taxis. 

 

This is one those times that I really, really want to talk to a stranger, the self-important tales I know that would pour out of him by simply smiling and blinking my lashes. The stories I could write about later, I can hear them formulating in my head as I sit across from him at the Apple help table.
 

But not today, today I need to get home, so today I am an observer instead of an active participant, the regret is real.