Free Problems with People by David Guterson Page B

winter mood, someone not subject to seasonal affective disorder, someone with a generous and outgoing outlook or equipped with outsized social graces, maybe this was just park etiquette, lonely park etiquette, It’s me, a stranger, but no one to worry about, Happy New Year, have a nice day. Enough worry! she thought, as he reached into his car for something. She saw only his upper back as he dug around for it. The exhaust stoppedrising; he’d killed his motor. Then he emerged with a phone in hand, which he held to his ear while opening a rear door. A lapdog on a leash jumped out, and the two of them began walking toward her with the guy pressing his phone to his ear and the dog taking fast, tiny steps.
    What was this about? What did it mean, the wave, then a call? You’re important, I’m glad to see you; you’ve dazzled me, you’re nothing, you’re wonderful … but … wait … okay … I have thirty seconds between greeting you with a wave and saying hi at close quarters, why not use it productively, check off a phone call, the message I’m sending you is—but, what was his message? It was definitely bizarre, his inordinate good cheer, his theatrical animation, his mincing dog, this guy now closing distance with his phone in one hand and his leash in the other, talking away even while the dog gave a tug and stopped so it could squat over the stiff grass, the guy turning to look in the direction of the pond and then in the opposite direction, surveying the park and, she thought, wondering if anyone besides her had noticed that he wasn’t getting down on his knees with a plastic mitt or a pooper scooper, after that evaluating the clouds as if his guilt-laden reconnaissance were part of a general love of nature—doing that for her sake—or maybe he was doing what people do in winter as the day gets on, because they’re worried—she was worried—about worsening weather and early darkness, not wanting to get caught out past a certain point, say four-thirty, that was about the right time to start home in January if you were out for a walk, maybe she could check her phone to see what time it was—but wouldn’t that be rude, to pull out her phone? No. People were always pullingout their phones, it didn’t have to mean anything. And he was on his phone. And yes, he was wearing a stocking cap, which was weird, too, although didn’t he have a right, in this weather, to a stocking cap? Or maybe, she thought, it was actually called a watch cap, the kind sailors wore on watch in cold weather, that was probably why it was called a watch cap though it was also the cap that thieves wore in movies, or rather burglars, cat burglars—black stretch pants, black turtleneck, black watch cap—while slipping noiselessly through a bedroom window one leg after the other. Was there a creepier hat than the hat this guy wore? The one with the eyeholes was definitely creepier; she couldn’t remember what it was called right now, how tempting it was to pull out her phone and—anyway, he wasn’t wearing that. He was wearing a watch or stocking cap, black, he put away his phone, his dog finished up, the two of them once more advanced. A guy in a lime-green parka, leading his little dog toward her and raising his hand again in that more than just slightly enthusiastic wave.
    She could see who he was now. It was Hamish McAdam, Hamish McAdam whose name used to make her privately laugh because “hamish,” to her, a Jewish girl, sort of—in adulthood she’d divested herself of Jewishness—meant, in Yiddish—spelled “haimish”—warm and cozy. How could there be a Hamish McAdam? A Yiddish-invoking first name and a Scottish last name, those didn’t go together and made you think, merged—or made her think, anyway—of a clansman in a kilt and a yarmulke. She thought of Hamish McAdam every semester when she put the word “macadam” up on PowerPoint among other Industrial Revolution terms—spinningjenny, flying shuttle, steam