August 14th

I am currently in New Orleans, roughly an hour away from the place I will be calling my home in a few short days. We decided to head down to the pool in our hotel; a beautiful, red brick building full of balconies and trailing greenery. We were lying there for a bit, soaking in the scenery, when an older man sat down on the edge. Initially, I will admit, I thought "Oh no, here comes an old man, near me for nefarious reasons". Though I was wrong, if you have been to New Orleans, you would know that amongst the many kind strangers, there are also a reasonable amount of drunks, and older men interested in women much too young for them. Regardless, we stayed for a few minutes, when he began to strike up conversation. He was rather soft spoken- a gentle, older man reminiscent of many southern types. He had a light drawl, and though slightly hard to understand, his words never strayed from kind and respectful. My mother and I talked with him for about an hour, and he began telling us about all parts of his life. To our surprise, he was in his early seventies- though his full head of hair and savvy style had initially led us to believe that he wasn't much older than sixty. He told us of his work as a copper salesman, and his life back in the heart of Mississippi. Most specifically, I remember the way he talked about his wife. They had been married sixty-two years, and he was quite obviously still very much in love with her. He had known her since the age of five, and recounted seeing her in the church choir when she was sixteen, how close she had always been with his mother, and when they had to wake up too early for a flight and she had forgotten to put on makeup-but he still thought she looked beautiful. He joked about acquiring my parents' number, and asking them how I was settling into college so he could make sure I was staying safe. He was never strange or awkward, just a person wanting to share his story with a little bit of the world. As he told us about his plight with cancer a few years ago, he finished by saying "But it's never been me I worry about, not a day. It's always my grandkids, and the young kids..." as he motioned towards me. More than anything, he was an endearing man, aged by what I could only assume to be a simple life. The time we shared with him served to me as a reminder of the power of a story. So often, we assume someone's intentions or life before we try to understand them, before we attempt empathy.