Even Walks Can Be Interesting When People Yell At You

Yesterday I started feeling antsy and needed to get out of the apartment. I wanted to get in a little physical activity but it was my day off from the gym and I didn't want to work out hard anyway so I decided to go for a walk around the neighborhood. Walking always destresses me and helps me to clear my mind when I have a lot on my plate and sitting in an apartment with boxes everywhere and thinking about all that I have to do, I was starting to feel a little anxious. So off I went with my ipod on in my own little world until I got to about Wishon and one of those little side streets near Fresno City.

I looked ahead and saw a somewhat disheveled man standing near the bus stop on my side of the street. Now normally if I feel at all uneasy I will cross the street to avoid people, but I figured this guy was just waiting for the bus. Unfortunately my inside voice should have been paying closer attention because my instinct was definitely wrong about this guy. I blame the Bob Marley that I was listening to at the time lulling me into a false sense of security. If I had been listening to Disturbed or something I would have totally seen this coming.

As soon as he spotted me he started walking towards me. I turned down my ipod so I could hear him if he said something, which of course he did. With a scowl on his face he demanded "where is Cedar and Belmont". Here is the thing with me, I do not like people who are impolite and typically react negatively to that. You are asking me for help, there is no need to be a dick and not ask simply say "excuse me do you know where cedar and Belmont is?". Obviously he has bigger issues though and being polite was not a priority but instead of ignoring him or being a dick back I opted to ignore the rudeness and try to help. Unfortunately I am incredibly bad with street names. I know how to go places mostly because of landmarks and if I am telling someone how to get somewhere instead of saying turn left at Maple I will say turn left at the 3rd street, there will be a Carls Jr on your right and a Walgreens on your left. I am a visual person.

In any case I knew where Cedar was but was initially a little fuzzy on the direction of Belmont. Finally I said well Cedar is this way and Belmont is that way so Cedar and Belmont would be that direction and I pointed South East. I am not sure what exactly he was looking for but this was apparently not an acceptable answer because he squinted his eyes at me and very harshly goes "oh you don't know, stupid woman". Oh no he di'nt!

He then yells the same question at that woman across the street walking her dog, apparently she was not a stupid woman, that title belonged to me. She turns and looks at him and then turns around and keeps walking. I try to keep walking past him and tell him "sorry but that is as specific as I can be". Part of me wanted to say more but this was a troubled man and my sympathetic side kicked in so I didn't. Ok that and I totally didn't want him to stab me in the back with his shank.

He wasn't quite ready to let it go though and then blamed me for all of his problems because I voted for McCain. Yeah, I am not kidding he said that. I know what you are thinking, there are so many things wrong with that statement, where do you even start? But I didnt-and he didnt-huh?? I was baffled but I figured having any kind of logical discussion was not going to happen so maybe if I just walked away he would stay where he was and leave me alone.

This pretty much worked and he did not follow me but keot yelling insults while I walked away and a few moments later some teenage boys in a car drove by and honked at me while one of them cat called out the window and upon hearing and seeing this he yelled at them "Don't honk at her! She is dumb and doesn't know where Cedar and Belmont is!". Ahh yes, these are the days of my life.