I'll admit this straight up: I'm not entirely fond of nor comfortable with strangers - at least on a social level. Put strangers in front of me that I need to teach and instruct and I'm fine - in my element - otherwise I prefer to smile, nod, and move along.
This past Monday it seemed as if I had a neon sign over my head (or car, as the case was) that said, "Feel free to weird out this person.", and it happened.
I was driving through the streets of Sturgeon Bay, minding my p's and q's, as usual, and I picked up a tail of a Sturgeon Bay police car, who chose to tail me for the next ten minutes, ultimately following me into a grocery store parking lot. He/she (I do not know the sex of the officer.) never activated the car's roof lights, just simply followed me. Once I turned into the parking lot and selected a parking space, the car moved along and out of the lot, onto the public street nearby.
Weird and highly annoying.
After I completed my grocery-store shopping, I pushed my cart out to my car, which was characteristically parked far out in the lot. As is always my practice, my purse is over my head and not just hanging from one shoulder. I always remove my purse, place it in the front passenger seat, set the locks and proceed to unload my cart. In this case, I had all the doors locked but the rear passenger door open in order to place the bags on the back seat. I had just begun to pick up a bag when I was approached by a man wearing a redish shirt, which is the general color of the store's employee-uniforms. (I never noticed if the shirt actually had the store's name imprinted on it.) He said, "Here, I'll help you unload and I'll take care of your cart." I really didn't want help because I am quite fussy about how my bags are unloaded and where they are placed but I acquiesced. (Upon reflection, I'd politely refuse another time.) He just sort of barged in and start handing me bags - even placing a couple in the car. Then he took my cart and walked off. I was thoroughly annoyed and watched where he walked. He did put the cart in the cart corral, but then got into a pickup very close to the store and drove off.
Weird and discomfortingly annoying.
I got into the car, immediately locking the doors, as is my customary practice and this red pickup parked one stall over. I noticed that the male driver was looking closely at my car. I said to myself, "Oh, for Pete's sake. Stop looking." He and a female passenger got out of the pick-up and the man approached me, signaling me to roll down my window. I thought unprintable thoughts to myself and let the window down just about two inches, low enough to speak through but high enough so as not to let a hand or arm through. He wanted to know what color the car was. I was polite, even though my annoyance had ratcheted up to the red zone. He and his companion then walked off and I was left wondering if there was some sort of neon sign above my head.
Weird, just weird.
I prefer to move through this world under the radar.
Ancora imparo
