METROPOLITAN DIARY
Special Skill
Dear Diary:
It was a lovely evening. My wife Andrea and I were walking down a mostly empty street in Brooklyn, returning from a funeral. I was quickly running out of relatives of a certain age.
A man who was walking in the opposite direction veered straight toward us, stopped abruptly and garbled a question through clenched teeth.
I answered, and he walked away. My wife was confused.
I explained that he had been asking for directions with a broken jaw that was wired shut.
Wow, she said, what are the chances he would ask the only person around who could understand him?
My years of being a dentist and talking to people with mouths full of cotton had finally been useful outside the office.
— Sal Selvaggio
First Apartment
Dear Diary:
I was furnishing my first apartment, circa 1982. I bought a velour sofa, a Ming-style side table and a lamp with a porcelain Chinese goddess base at Macy’s.
I decided to return the lamp. When I got to the store, there was a long line at the return counter.
As I was waiting, the man ahead of me turned around, looked at me and then looked at the lamp.
“Take it home and learn to love it,” he said and turned back around.
— Marianne Kobbe
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/05/nyregion/metropolitan-diary.html
