Well, That's a First
So I'm out on a dog-walk this morning and I'm propositioned. Right on my street. Right to my face. At 8:30 in the a.m.
Down near the Cinderella pedestrian-bridge where the river Thames separates my neighbourhood from the western end of downtown Hicksville. Me and Rover are headed home and passing all the sad sacks headed to their offices downtown.
I always cross to the other side of the street when other people are coming towards us on the sidewalk because they may be intimidated by Rover. He's a Great Dane, you know. Anyway, I cross the street to be polite and damned if this young girl heading towards us doesn't cross with me. And actually comes up to us. And says she wants to ask me something. Actually a couple of things. Like does your dog bite? "Occassionally," I say - even tho Rover's bark is worse than his non-existant bite. I pretty well know what's coming - altho you never expect to be hit up for spare change in your own neighbourhood no matter how close it is to downtown - even tho, now that I think of it, someone actually did that to us just last weekend.
She's about 20 at the most. Hair pulled back in a pony-tail, dressed like me (shabbily,) and looking like she just woke up or hasn't slept for a while. Her hands are slightly shaking as she drags from the cigarette she just lit and her eyes have that looking-right-thru-you vacancy that all strung-out drug users have in common. I can guess what the last question will be at this point.
"Where are you going?" A dog walk. "Do you live around here?" Nearby. "Who do you live with?" My wife and family. "Can you get me a job?" Huh, no. "Can you at least help me out with like, even five bucks?" Sorry, no - I really don't have any money. ... And I didn't. So me and Rover take off, hoping she doesn't follow.
And about ten steps away, it finally sinks in - Hey, she didn't ask if I could get her a job. She asked if I wanted to get a blow-job!
Well, that's never happened before. Not on my own street. Certainly not when I mention that I live nearby with a wife and kids. Well, actually, it's never happened. For some reason, I'm not constantly accosted by women offering to service me. Or by guys for that matter. I could run naked thru a gay bath-house and no one would even have the decency to make that request. Okay, well, now it's finally happened. But since there would undoubtedly be a financial transaction involved, I suppose I shouldn't feel too flattered. I guess it doesn't count. Not that I'm keeping score.
Don't matter anyway. What really shocked me about all this was not that it happened in my neighbourhood - the Free Press had done a story just a couple of days ago about downtown becoming the new East London with an invasion of drug addicts, prostitutes and homeless neer'do-wells.
No, what was upsetting was that this girl was no prostitute. She wasn't dressed like one. It took her 10 ways to Sunday to even get to the point. She was so embarrassed to ask that she looked at the ground and mumbled that whole business about a job. And she was so inexperienced at it that initially I didn't even know what was being offered. She was just a hard-up desperate drug addict.
You know, I wish I did have $5 on me that I could have just handed her and walked away. I know that she would have spent it on whatever drug is making her stoop so low in the first place. But at least that's better than the thought of her having to proposition fifty-year-old slightly-balding/about two pounds overweight men out walking their dog at 8:30 in the morning.
Sheesh! After all, the next guy she offers to perform oral sex upon may not be as scrupulous - or hard of hearing as I am.
Down near the Cinderella pedestrian-bridge where the river Thames separates my neighbourhood from the western end of downtown Hicksville. Me and Rover are headed home and passing all the sad sacks headed to their offices downtown.
I always cross to the other side of the street when other people are coming towards us on the sidewalk because they may be intimidated by Rover. He's a Great Dane, you know. Anyway, I cross the street to be polite and damned if this young girl heading towards us doesn't cross with me. And actually comes up to us. And says she wants to ask me something. Actually a couple of things. Like does your dog bite? "Occassionally," I say - even tho Rover's bark is worse than his non-existant bite. I pretty well know what's coming - altho you never expect to be hit up for spare change in your own neighbourhood no matter how close it is to downtown - even tho, now that I think of it, someone actually did that to us just last weekend.
She's about 20 at the most. Hair pulled back in a pony-tail, dressed like me (shabbily,) and looking like she just woke up or hasn't slept for a while. Her hands are slightly shaking as she drags from the cigarette she just lit and her eyes have that looking-right-thru-you vacancy that all strung-out drug users have in common. I can guess what the last question will be at this point.
"Where are you going?" A dog walk. "Do you live around here?" Nearby. "Who do you live with?" My wife and family. "Can you get me a job?" Huh, no. "Can you at least help me out with like, even five bucks?" Sorry, no - I really don't have any money. ... And I didn't. So me and Rover take off, hoping she doesn't follow.
And about ten steps away, it finally sinks in - Hey, she didn't ask if I could get her a job. She asked if I wanted to get a blow-job!
Well, that's never happened before. Not on my own street. Certainly not when I mention that I live nearby with a wife and kids. Well, actually, it's never happened. For some reason, I'm not constantly accosted by women offering to service me. Or by guys for that matter. I could run naked thru a gay bath-house and no one would even have the decency to make that request. Okay, well, now it's finally happened. But since there would undoubtedly be a financial transaction involved, I suppose I shouldn't feel too flattered. I guess it doesn't count. Not that I'm keeping score.
Don't matter anyway. What really shocked me about all this was not that it happened in my neighbourhood - the Free Press had done a story just a couple of days ago about downtown becoming the new East London with an invasion of drug addicts, prostitutes and homeless neer'do-wells.
No, what was upsetting was that this girl was no prostitute. She wasn't dressed like one. It took her 10 ways to Sunday to even get to the point. She was so embarrassed to ask that she looked at the ground and mumbled that whole business about a job. And she was so inexperienced at it that initially I didn't even know what was being offered. She was just a hard-up desperate drug addict.
You know, I wish I did have $5 on me that I could have just handed her and walked away. I know that she would have spent it on whatever drug is making her stoop so low in the first place. But at least that's better than the thought of her having to proposition fifty-year-old slightly-balding/about two pounds overweight men out walking their dog at 8:30 in the morning.
Sheesh! After all, the next guy she offers to perform oral sex upon may not be as scrupulous - or hard of hearing as I am.
posted by Sonny Drysdale at 10:52 AM
1 Comments:
That's right, DT. No doubt at all.
I felt kind of awkward about the whole thing once I realized what she had actually said.
But I handled it in my with characteristic sophisticated aplomb - I wet myself.
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