Sans Fig Leaf
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"Signals"
23 October, 2003
Several years ago I was on a bus crowded bus in downtown Seattle when I noticed a man looking at me funny. There were several things about him--his attire, his hair cut, wearing mirrored sunglasses at night, his body language--that screamed "reactionary, weight-liftin', gun-totin' redneck."
And I was wearing big gold hoop earrings that day.
I tried to ignore him, but he seemed to be glaring at me constantly. There had been several bashings reported in the news during the previous weeks, and my imagination was producing dozens of scenarios that all ended with me lying bleeding in a gutter somewhere. We reached a stop where I needed to transfer to another bus. I was never so relieved to step off a bus in my life.
Until I reached the little shelter at the stop and turned around.
He was climbing out of the bus behind me. He was still glaring at me as he sauntered toward me. He paused about four feet from where I was standing, and glanced around.
The bus was pulling away. I was weighing my options.
He came closer, stopping about two feet from me. He looked around again, as if making sure that no one was going to interfere with his assault on me.
His lips curled into a sneer, and he said, "Woof!"
I blinked and stuttered out, "Excuse me?"
He wanted my phone number. Well, actually, he was hoping that I had an apartment nearby that I would invite him into to fool around, but he was willing to settle for my phone number. I had to tell him that my boyfriend, who was expecting me home soon, would have to agree to anything like that, and we wound up having a very friendly chat until my bus came along.
I had misinterpretted his non-verbal communication. Since I don't have a lot of experience with strangers making passes at me, you can just chalk it up to inexperience and be done with it. Except for another incident one morning about a year later.
I got on my usual bus to go to work. I had just settled into a seat when I noticed a guy that I had gone to college with. I hadn't seen him in several years. I caught his eye, smiled, and nodded. He gave me a prefunctory nod back, and became very interested in the view out the window. I didn't think much of it, since I'm not very comfortable talking with people--even ones I know--on public transit. I just assumed that he was in a similar headspace. I would see him about every other day. As we sometimes caught different buses. Once or twice I said,'hello,' and he would answer, 'hi." And that was it.
A few months later my friend, Julie (who had also known this guy in college), mentioned that she had been chatting with the same old friend, and that he had mentioned that he saw me every now and then on the bus, but was afraid to talk to me. Why? Because I was scary-looking, what with my leather jacket and all.
She said that she laughed and told him it was silly to be afraid of me.
So the next time I saw him on the bus, I greeted him in the most exaggerated, perky tone of voice I could muster: "Hi, Tom! Nice to see you! Julie says you're doing well."
He cracked up. After laughing for a few seconds, he asked me to sit down. We had a nice conversation for the rest of the bus ride. Once we were past the initial pleasantries, he apologized for having been intimidated before. What it came down to was that when he had known me before I came out of the closet. He was from a conservative religious background and had leaped to all kinds of conclusions when he heard about my coming out. Because of those conclusions, I ceased to be an old friend and became an incomprehensible being. It wasn't until I made him laugh that he reconnected the person he had known with the person I had become. When we saw each other on subsequent bus trips we would have friendly, if brief, visits.
Every day we are called upon to make dozens of decisions based on non-verbal cues from strangers. Their clothing, facial expressions, gestures, tone of voice can communicate volumes. But there is also enormous room for miscommunication. And the less we empathize with the other person the less likely we are to interpret correctly.