Here I present two delightful encounters I’ve had in recent days.

One day last week I was walking home from work. I saw the security guard from my bank walking home and he started hailing me to cross the street and talk to him. He is an elegant, elderly gentleman and was dressed in his forest green work-issued blazer. He started telling me about a road race, a 5K the next day in the corporate area. Turns out he has seen me running in the mornings. He is also a runner. In fact, he reached around to pull something out from his knapsack. He proudly showed me his bib number for the next day’s race. His name is Denzil (like the actor) Lewis (like the boxer) and he has won his category for his age group (60-69) for the past four races he has run. He encouraged me to turn out for the race the next day and promised to keep me informed about any upcoming events.

Yesterday, all of a sudden, a young man popped his head around the corner and greeted me very energetically. I’d never seen him before and thought he was one of the youth we work with. But apparently, he lives just down the road and visits the YOU offices frequently. We had a great chat about music (he loves Lady Gaga, Beyonce, Katy Perry) and life in general. He was very curious about why I am here. At first he asked me what part of America I am from. Then he grilled me on the whole volunteering arrangement that brought me here. He would make a great journalist. We were having a riveting conversation. Then, he paused, looked at me intently, and asked “So what do you think of the whole slavery thing?” I laughed because I could not tell if he was serious or not. He was. I truly did not know how to respond, so I just went with “It was obviously a horrible, horrible thing that should never have happened.” He seemed satisfied with that and we resumed our conversation about music and traveling and school. Then, with equal abruptness, he said, “Well, I see I am distracting you from your work, so I will say goodbye.” And then he was gone.