This is exactly the kind of thing that makes me a little kinder, and things a little more visible to me.
Last evening I was enjoying a glass of Baileys and milk when the doorbell rang. I eagerly opened the door to find a Chinese lady with bags full of copy copy DVDs.
My knee-jerk reaction has always been to say "no money, she she..." and shut the door.
And then I realized, the Chinese lady was human too. And I needed someone --- anyone --- to keep my mind off the very distracting and destructive thought of the boy next door.
So I let her in and bought what seemed like a 1000-in-1 DVD for only 20 AED. Not bad. Not bad at all.
So she thanked me and kept on smiling like she was trying to tell me something. While I didn't want to answer her with my meaningless forced smiling, I got creative. I opened the BBC website and showed her the pictures of the recent earthquake in China. Her face fell. Ok I just ruined her day.
Anyway we ended our chat happily, by exchanging She She's. And she promised to be back. When she's back I hope I won't ignore her anymore.
Even if I had my life back.
So there. I can't believe certain feelings soften your boundaries and allow you to be more open to others.
This is the kind of feeling that makes you finally buy a DVD from the Chinese lady you usually shooed away on a normal day.
This is the kind of feeling that makes you buy hair spray.
This is the kind of feeling that discourages you to eat like a trucker.
This is the kind of feeling that makes you watch the movies and read the books you've put off for so long.
This is the kind of feeling that just makes you stand in front of the mirror and dance to Glamorous by Fergie.
And make sure that your hair is the right kind of messy.
And sleep on Desperate Housewives dreaming of killing Terri Hatcher.