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“Oh hellooooo Norma!” she says too excitedly,  “how are you?”  she beams, leaning into my bubble so closely I can’t figure out which feature on her face I should be focussing on.

“Goooooood.”  I say awkwardly.  Melodically.  Reluctantly … distracted by my brain busy running through its internal catalogue of faces, voices, places, acquaintances and connections.

Nothing.

I got noth-thing, my brain says.  No iota who this cheerful blonde lady with a tall athletic daughter and handsome teenage son standing closeby could be.   The kids see us talking and carry on with whatever they are ogling.

“How did law school go?”

She knows about law school.

She’s someone from school.  A teacher.  She lives in Belleville you dolt.  Not everybody commutes to Kingston.

No wait.  She’s someone from Zach’s school.

Kids too old … someone from Zach’s sporting activities … kids still too old Einstein.  Yeah, well she might have younger kids that just aren’t here … or maybe those closeby kids aren’t her kids … they just look freakishly like her.  I argue with myself.

“Yeah, you know, made it through exams.  Lots of stress.  I’m so glad they’re done now and I can get down to enjoying some of this beautiful weather we’re having.”  I say nonchalantly as if I’m totally honed in on this conversation and this moment as opposed to the internal massacre I’m experiencing while killing myself trying to figure out who the heck I’m speaking to.  “You’re just here picking up a few things?”  I say in an attempt to divert the conversation, hopefully towards an end that involves going separate directions before I really embarrass myself. 

You can ask her who she is you know, the battle starts again.  You know the whole - I’m so sorry, I know that I know you, but I just can’t figure out from where, and then yeah you can totally play up the whole stressed out travelling army law student single mom you’re kind of crazy with only so much room in your brain that is the reality of your life.  I picture us laughing it off, but remember that I’m a total social coward and would rather fake it than be real with this lady.

“Mmmyeah,” she says nodding towards the kids that look just like her.  “The kids are between sports, so we thought we would run in and grab some Kraft Dinner.  KD night - good for the weeknight rush.  But then you know, once you’re in you realize that you need all kinds of other things too,” she says acknowledging her basket heavy with things that aren’t KD. 

I nod along approvingly thinking about how much I love KD.  Mmmm, especially when you get just the right amount of butter and milk and it turns out on the verge of creamy, and mmmm, ketchup …  it’s all good.  Maybe I need a KD night too, I think.

“We better get going.  It was good to see you Norma.  Take care of yourself and I hope you get a break.”

“Yeah, see yah later.  Enjoy the KD.” 

Weird.  Who? the heck? was that?  I keep her in my peripheral in order to keep comparing her to the images in the hazy catalogue of my mind, and to maintain avoidance.  I realize I’m done.  Done trying to figure it out and decide to let it go.  Oh and done shopping, so I head to the cash.

There she is again.  In the lane beside me.  Loading up her cart.  We’re going to be through at the same time.  Lots of eye contact and more chit chat ensues.  Gahd, soOO much chit chat.  Me there, wondering if she has any inkling that I’m at stage 5 of total recognition failure.  The stage where you know it’s going to completely consume you until 4a.m. when you suddenly jolt upright and say aloud, Jane Doe, and collapse in relief.  Too bad her name isn’t Jane Doe.  This would be over right now if it were, I wish to myself.

So we start walking out together.  “Any big summer plans?” I ask.

“Not really.  No not really too much,” she says, “we’re sooo busy this week.  It’s window cleaning season <ding> and a lot of clients have asked us to do some spring cleaning things around their homes, so it’s hard to foresee a time when things will let up, you know?” she asks rhetorically.

I nod and wonder if I’m glowing under the illumination of the moon size LIGHT BULB and WHOOP WHOOP that just went off above my head.  She’s one of the two housekeepers.

“Oh, this is my daughter, X (yeah, her name went in one ear and out the other as I basked in the relief of realizing the blonde close talker is my cleaner),”  she says.  “X, this is Norma, the lady I was telling you all about … the one in the Army who travels all over the world to neat places like Africa.  She was just in Africa.  So neat.  And South America too.” She turns to me.  “That’s right eh, you were in South America as well.  AND she goes to Queen’s and has a little boy named Zach.”  She turns back to X.  “Neat eh?”

Neat.  I picture her cleaning the mementoes I’ve collected this past year during my travels to cities on five different continents.  Wondering if she ever thinks “Goddamn knickknacks … I hate dusting,” because you know, that is so totally what I would be thinking.  Nahhh, judging by the enthusiastic expression of “neats” she has formed other far more positive opinions of who I must be based on what I own. 

After a few more brief and relevant (on my part) pleasantries, that include my own order for window cleaning, we part ways.

I load my car and I contemplate.   I wonder what story my possessions tell her.  And I think about her being in my home every other week.  I wonder if she notices the tears on my pillow, senses the doom I routinely feel on account of the stress of my life, or if she just sees my things and rationalizes them in a way that makes sense for her.  World travelling over-achieving super-human. 

Neat.

And I realize, to her, the stranger in my house . . . is me. 

Update on Wednesday, December 16, 2009 at 10:51PM by Norma Jean Barrett

This was originally written in June of 2007.  I have pulled it from the archives for December’s round in The Great Experiment.  

If you liked my piece, click here to go to the girlwho website.  There you will find a list of entries.  DO NOT click on my entry to vote.  Rather, you have to scroll down to the comment section and post a comment that says you are voting for me!  You can either put your name as the author of the comment, or you can choose to vote anonymously.  Totally up to you!

Thanks for reading and Happy Christmas.