I’m walking home with my friend Chris. We stop at a bodega to pick up a bouquet of flowers. I’ve taken to bringing home flowers once a week, to offset the smell of sweaty gym socks in my apartment. I settle on some stargazers and the bodega owner wraps them up for me. Chris and I head for my place.
We stop at the corner, where a cute young lass is waiting for the light to change. She looks over at the flowers, then gets this look on her face like she’s about to let loose a tremendous sigh.
“It’s because he doesn’t appreciate you,” says Chris to the cute girl.
“Excuse me?”
“Your boyfriend,” says Chris. “That’s why you can’t remember the last time he brought you flowers.”
She turns away, but then turns back.
“How did you know that’s what I was thinking?”
Five minutes of idle chitchat follow. I stand there looking like a dweeb, holding a bouquet of flowers, while Chris schools me on picking up cute girls in the middle of Manhattan in cold weather.
Chris walks away from the encounter with a name and a phone number. We continue down the street. As soon as she’s out of earshot, I ask the question.
“Master Yoda,” I ask, “how can I learn to use the Force to sweep innocent young ladies off their feet?”
“That path leads to the Dark Side,” says Chris, cracking a smile. “But the gimmick is no Jedi mind trick.”
“Well?”
“It’s quite simple,” says Chris. “When something like that happens, you need to think fast. Put yourself in the young woman’s shoes and ask yourself ‘What is she thinking right now?’ Then, it’s a simple matter of jumping ahead three or four exchanges into the conversation.”
“Jumping ahead?”
“Yes. When she looked at the flowers, a sad look came over her face. What could possibly make a young lady sad about seeing a $10 bunch of flowers?”
“Not getting them.”
“Exactly.”
“You know, my mom once gave me a two-volume set of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s complete stories about Sherlock Holmes,” I say. “He was the true master of deduction.”
“That’s where I got the idea,” says Chris. “You remember the one where Holmes sees Watson’s eyes resting on a painting?”
“Yep,” says I, “and he deduces all sorts of goofy stuff as a result.”
“You just have to take it a step further,” says Chris. “Just don’t use it for evil, or forever will it dominate your destiny.”
I can’t wait to try it at the next opportunity.