ACCOUNTANT BY DAY

Yesterday morning when I woke up, I had planned originally to go work out on the elliptical machine.  But when I woke up, the idea just sounded like the last thing in the world I wanted to do.  Then I decided to see if the dog wanted to go walking with me.  We went to Pierson Park over on 55th Street and spent half an hour running and walking around the park.  It was actually really nice, although I have never really enjoyed exercising outdoors that much before.  It made me pretty sore, which is interesting, since I thought I was getting a decent workout from the elliptical machine.  Maybe not as good as I thought.

It was such a nice walk that today I decided to take the dog and go back to the park with her after work, even though I went on the elliptical this morning and it looked like it could rain.  When I was parking the car, I noticed a white truck circling the parking area, but it didn’t stop, which I thought was weird.  The driver, a guy who looked like he was in his forties, continued driving and went down one of the roads back into the park.  I shrugged, clipped the leash on the dog, and started walking down the hill.

Then I saw a young girl walking quickly toward me.  She looked a little scared.  “Miss!” she said, looking anxiously behind her.  “Can I walk with you?”

“Sure!” I agreed.  I suspected something was wrong, but I wasn’t sure what.

“That man in the white truck has been following me around the park,” she told me.  “He stopped a couple times and tried to get me to get in the truck and he kept asking me questions about myself.”

“What a creep!” I said.  “We’ll walk with you and I’ll keep an eye out for this guy.”

“I tried calling my mom, but she didn’t answer,” the girl said.  “I was getting scared, because he kept circling around and following me.”

“Ugh,” I told her.  Then I saw the man driving out of the park and down the street.  “It looks like he’s gone,” I said.  “But I’ll stick with you anyway, just in case.”

We introduced ourselves and began walking around the park.  She was very friendly and we chatted as we walked.  Apparently she has moved here from Arkansas.  She used to own a rottweiler named Princess that she loved SOOOO much, but had to leave her behind with family.  “If Princess was here,” she said, “that guy would be too scared to stop his truck.”  She told me she had been instructed by her doctor to begin walking for exercise several days a week, because he was afraid that her weight problem was going to cause her some serious health problems.  This, of course, is a refrain familiar to me.  She is 14 and in the 8th grade, which is the same age at which I began to have a weight problem.  We compared stories and I shared some of my experiences related to being overweight in high school.

After a little while, her mother phoned back.  “Yeah, a creepy man in a truck was following me,” she told her mother, “but I met a lady and her dog in the park and they are walking with me, so the man left.  Her name is Melissa and she’s 26, so everything is OK now.”

I was privately amused at how it sounded like my being 26 was the deciding factor.  Everybody knows that men in trucks are powerless against 26 year olds.

We walked and chatted for another half hour or so, and she told me that she will be walking at the park regularly on most Mondays and Fridays at least.

“Not to sound like a creepy older person myself,” I said, “but it was fun having someone to talk to.  If you want company sometime when you’re out walking, I can give you my phone number.  If not, that’s OK too.”

“That would be great!” she said.

We traded numbers, then said good night and went our separate ways.  She is a nice kid.  I think the reason I liked her so much is that I could see a little of myself in her.  She is also a fairly good conversationalist for a person her age.  So maybe we’ll walk in the park this Friday.