The woman working the deli counter at the Safeway today decided that I should sample of all of the meats. She was quite kindly and seemed more invested in my sampling the meats than I was in not sampling them, so I sampled away, all but the ham, about a quarter pound total, off of wax deli sheets with her standing there beaming at me. “You like?” She was middle-aged, Ethiopian, high-cheekboned, with her hair done up in beautiful braids. She reminded me somewhat of my mother and so I surmised that perhaps I reminded her somewhat of her son.

Tags: encounters