My Newspaper Guy
04.24.09
I have a strange relationship with my newspaper guy. Which is to say that I have any relationship at all.
I should say that I have a natural aversion to RFIs (Recurring Forced Interactions), be they with receptionists, security guards, deli clerks, or guys who sell you newspapers. If I have to talk to you every day, it's going to start to wear on me after awhile, because -- even if you're the nicest person in the world (i.e. Jim Gillstein of Blue Ridge, North Dakota) -- there's going to come a day when I don't feel like talking.
And so there's this newspaper guy... Not a newspaper stand guy, mind you. He's just a guy who stands on the corner by my subway stop in the morning who sells newspapers. If this were the 1930's, he'd be a cute kid from Brooklyn with a brown beanie and a perplexing speech impediment.
And he doesn't speak very much English, but we seem to have come to an understanding. (That understanding being, when I give him money, he gives me a copy of The Daily News.) And it's gotten to the point where he will hand me a paper as soon as I walk up to him.
And it's a fine system when it works. I give him 50 cents. He gives me a newspaper. I go to work. Easy. No small talk, which as I've made clear earlier, is a plus.
But then there are the days that things don't go as planned. There are the days that he starts flagging me down when I'm half a block away to indicate that he's out of The Daily News. To be sure I understand him properly, I mouth the words "Wha Zuh?" He'll then continue to flap his arms until I cross over to the bodega across the street and get my paper there.
But if I'm running late, and I assume he's out of The Daily News, and cross the street preemptively, he'll get all flustered. Or if I come too late, and he's gone, he may growl at me the next morning, "Where you be? I save! Waited ten minutes!"
And I can't really respond to that because, as mentioned earlier, he speaks no English. Well, now that I'm thinking about it, I guess he knows the words "where," "you," "be," "I," "save," "waited," "ten," and "minutes."
Mainly, I don't like talking to people.
And heaven forbid I decide to not buy a newspaper on a particular day. Say, if I want to read a book instead. Or maybe I'm so drunk that the very thought of reading is going to make my eyes bleed. (Does that happen? I don't drink that much.) I'd have to sneak past him!
And he has eyes like a hawk. Once he chased after me with a paper (probably thinking I forgot). And if I pretend I have no money, he spots me the 50 cents.
The big jerk.
And so this morning I decided, if I ever want to stop buying the newspaper, I'm just going to have to move. Or leave my house at 3 in the morning. Or...
*shudder*
...have a conversation.
Stoopid RFIs.