January 7: The Stranger-Turn-Friend

In New York City, you need two perceptions to survive:

1. The ability to be open and adapt to anyone you meet, and
2. The ability to be on your guard and wary of anyone you meet

The trick is knowing when to do which. When you're a single woman hanging out at a bar, you tend to go for option 2. But hey, sometimes you're wrong.

I recognized this guy from my year at the bar. I knew he frequented there, and honestly, though I had no desire to talk to him despite him talking to a lot of the same people I might on another day, or reminding me of someone from home, inevitably we crossed paths.

I did the small talk scene. We had a mutual barfly-friend between us that helped break the ice and keep a buffer, but then he dropped a bomb on me: he was an MFA Fiction student at the institution and in the program that I had been looking into for myself.

Before I knew it, I was going at a mile a minute asking questions and getting his insight on the program, other programs, application process, lifestyle and future of someone in this program, and he was only happy to reciprocate. He knew of someone who could help me even further with my own situation and offered to put us in touch.

I just figured it was so ironic that one of the only regulars I hadn't bothered to know turned out to have more in common with me than any of the others. He was a stranger-turned-friend in one day. Still, better to be wary of a sane person than open to an insane one. I stand by my decision!