She just showed up in my life, as we ended up in the same place at the same time on a regular basis. We're both people that tend to be remembered and at least part of that is that we're both a little weird, so when I didn't see her for a while, I noticed. In fact, I missed seeing her, though we hadn't even spoken. Then she showed up again one day and I said rather cheerily "Haven't seen you in a long time!" She sputtered out "Ga ki bah di mmmm...." shaking her head up and down and I found it completely charming (irresistible, really) that she was completely flustered that I deigned to speak to her. "Hi. I'm Steve," I added. She responded, "I'm waiting for a taxi." Non-sequiturs like that were going to be common in the rare occasions she spoke.
I have a tendency to fall for women that have qualities I wish I had and Carla (not her real name; her real name doesn't suit her) had an ability to do some things easily that I just can't, basic life skills that I really should've mastered. I in turn had some abilities she didn't, most notably her being nearly non-verbal made a lot of things difficult for her and I have a knack for deciphering what people need who can't explain things for themselves. [No, I'm not available for babysitting]
Getting to know her was a painstaking process, because I couldn't just ask her a question and get an answer. I discovered that I had misjudged her age by a lot - I noticed first that she didn't have any real sun damage to her skin, then that she didn't have any fine lines at the corners of her eyes; I was dating age-inappropriately. I also discovered, to my surprise, that others found her physically attractive and assumed that that was the only reason I was interested in her. I had to mull it over: tall, slender, blonde, blue eyed, with a tendency to show off her legs in short shorts and skirts - yeah, I could see what they saw.
Only photos I have don't show much (she's very camera shy):
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| 80 degrees and wearing a hoodie - staring at nothing |
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| Jaywalking bag lady look |
Eventually, her weirdness was getting to be a bit much, even for me. She carried things in a Zip-loc bag rather than a purse, though I bought her a nice clutch in her two colors: red and black; it was practical - she could see what she wanted through clear plastic. I never saw her eat; she drank an enormous amount of soda (yet her teeth are perfect), but in six months I never saw her eat. I once saw her sorting laundry on a public bus, sniffing things to see if they needed to be washed, testing the elastic on a bra, etc. When buying something, she'd often find herself short of cash and would ask me or strangers for money; it didn't matter to her who she asked. For reasons I never figured out (it might have to do with attention or hearing), when she made a phone call, which was rare as she rarely spoke, she'd bend over - and when it got colder and she started wearing tights under her shorts, this would cause the shorts to slide to her knees; if she weren't wearing the tights, she'd be mooning the world; at first, I just pulled them up for her, later I'd tell her to pull them up, eventually I just stopped caring.
I figured out that what "gifts" she had turned out to be a simple lack of shame. If she wanted something, she did what she had to do to get it. That was so foreign to me that it seemed charming for a while. I tend to fall in love with an idealized version of someone and then, as I learn details, substitute loving the real things for the imagined. As I realized there wasn't anything that was going to work out or improve, she moved on to another guy, who quite frankly, seems a better match.
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