City moments

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

I was running a errand in downtown Chicago over lunch, which took me to Michigan Ave. A man asked me if I could spare some change for a Viet Nam veteran. Not having any change I declined, which led him to sputter, “Well, why don’t you go back to Germany!”
Deciding that such marvellous incongruity could not go unrewarded, I dug a dollar out of my wallet. After he snatched it from me, he tried to spit on me.
Maybe 20 steps more took me into the Fine Arts Building - http://www.ci.chi.il.us/Landmarks/F/FineArts.html - a lovely old lady dating from 1885, originally incarnated as a Studebaker showroom. For some reason it gave me considerable pleasure to be taken to the seventh floor in an attendant-operated elevator.

Walking back afterwards, my primary thought was that folks who don’t live in a few big cities would be highly unlikely to enjoy this particular confluence of experiences.

You have any recent “only in a big city” vignettes to share?

2

Three years ago, hubby and then-8 son and I took a trip to NYC, where we had the pleasure of being squired around by hubby’s former college roommate, a Manhattan resident.

We were on the subway one day, and a group of young black guys came into the car, plunked down a boombox, and proceeded to perform the most amazing break-dancing I’d ever seen, then passed the hat (to which we glady contributed) before dashing off to the next car.

Son turns to our tourguide/friend and says, somewhat awed, “Jerry, is this a common occurrence on the subway?” I don’t know what made me laugh harder – the way he phrased his question or the fact that what he had just seen was completely outside his realm of experience.