I thought they were kidding!!

As a first year grad student, I often read articles and books for classes on the bus. One day, I was reading an article about women's electoral behavior soon after they received the right to vote (go Merriam and Gosnell!) while riding the bus and a strange event occurred. A man sat down right next to me. Now, it wasn't exactly a crowded a bus, but it wasn't completely strange that this man would sit down where he did. But then, when he grabbed my article (what would Merriam and Gosnell say?) and started to write his phone number on the back!, I considered this to be the strange event!! I was appalled. I mean, did he think I would call him after he attacked my article on the bus?!

I told this story to person after person. Men were always sort of mystified. "Do you often have men approach you on the bus?" (The answer is that it sort of depends on what bus you are travelling on.) Women, almost universally, countered with a story of their own. "One time, a man approached me, started asking me questions, and followed me when I got off at my stop." "I was dozing on the bus and when I woke up there was a man sleeping on my shoulder." "I found myself in the middle of a fistfight in the back of the bus with one guy who claimed the other guy had sullied my honor. I didn't know either of them."

Based on this (albeit small n) sample of horror tales from women in reference to the sometimes woes of mass transit, men would always say something about how it was a numbers game. Men would hit on lots and lots of women and eventually they would find someone who would give them attention. I honestly thought this was hogwash. I mean, what kind of woman would think, oh, I think this guy is lonely, I will give him my phone number? What kind of woman would be attracted to a guy so desperate that he is walking up to multiple strangers on a bus (I can understand thinking, hey, that girl I see on the bus every morning is cute - maybe I'll ask her out, but I can't understand thinking, hey, I'll never see these people again - maybe I'll ask every woman on the bus if she knows that I can get lost in her eyes)? Honestly. I just can't imagine anything good would come out of hookup from the bus.

Since my first year in grad school, I have perfected a routine on mass transit whereby no one dares to talk to me. I read, I grade, I look perfectly standoffish. I do NOT talk to strangers on the bus. (It may also have to do with the fact that I am older now that they don't talk to me as often, but I don't want to mess around with too many variables here. I look, mostly, the same.)

So here's the story.

Setting: Train 9:45 pm on a Thursday night, Minneapolis, Minnesota
Characters: NGS, drunk guy with a 40 in his hand, cute girl sitting next to window

NGS: (reading, reading, reading)
Drunk Guy: (moves across the mostly empty train to sit right next to NGS)
NGS: (reading, reading, ignoring drunk guy next to her, although he smells badly)
Drunk Guy: (quietly) Isp teya teallya?
NGS: (reading, reading, reading)
Drunk Guy: Isp teya teallya?
NGS: (reading, reading, reading)
Drunk Guy: (nudging NGS with elbow) Isp teya teallya?
NGS: What?
Drunk Guy: Isp teya teallya? (points at his wrist)
NGS: (digging around in purse for cell phone) It's 9:50. (goes back to reading)

30 seconds elapse

Drunk Guy: Isga tra toma amerika?
NGS: What?
Drunk Guy: Isga tra toma amerika? (points ahead)
NGS: Yes, this train goes to the Mall of America. (reading, reading, reading)

30 seconds elapse

Drunk Guy: Sorry to wattee. (walks across nearly empty train to sit down right next to this gorgeous young woman with long dark hair pulled back in a headband, who had been peacefully gazing out the window until the drunk guy sits next to her)

(Drunk Guy and Cute Girl start chatting. NGS pretends to read, but really keeps an eye out on the drunk guy, afraid he might do something even more appropriate than he has already done. Meanwhile, NGS starts collecting her stuff, getting ready to get off the train at the next stop. As she does this, she notices that the Drunk Guy and Cute Girl are kissing!!!!)

NGS: Oh, no!!! (horrified gasp)

So, what kind of woman actually talks to strange men on mass transit? A cute girl with her hair pulled back in a hairband. I guess it is all a numbers game.