Chatting up strangers is one of the joys of living in a civilized society. I was brought by an extraordinarily social woman, my aunt, who held that one should be able to talk equally to everyone "from the president of the company to the guy who sweeps the floor" - neither deferential or condescending, as we were all "equal in the eyes of the Lord." But then, I was a child of the 50s when talking to strangers was not drilled into my small head as the path to danger, the way it is for today's small children. Child abuse prevention programs stress this sort of thing, and as a teacher, never being alone with a child in a closed room. I'll still talk with small children who cross my path, but I always check to see if nearby guardians aren't alarmed. Sad situation.

I do talk to mail carriers, restaurant waitstaff, store clerks, other audience members, stray musicians, all sorts of folks, in ways that go beyond the necessary interactions. I think the best serious conversation I had was with a stranger on my one trip alone to London in about1985.I was on a bench outside the V&A museum, trying to decide where to go for dinner. I asked the gent sitting on the next bench if he knew of somewhere nearby. He didn't - was on an rare(for him) visit from the Midlands. Asking where I was from got us launched into a fascinating discussion of our relative regional and personal economies, comapring the Midlands to Midwest/Great Lakes rust belt. The differences in things like what sort of appliances a modest apartment mifght have to the differences that would dictate in grocery shopping to where and when hospitality happens... Must have answered and generated questions for near two hours.

I wonder, as we get less civilized, if it will become less of a pleasure to talk to strangers. In recent years, verbal interaction with strangers has often been more in the vein of attacks. Apologizing to a stranger for a blunder I made, I was greeted with obscenities and abusive language. I wonder, if "stranger danger" drilled in from such an early age short circuits some discernment channels for adult contact so that a bonehead traffic move that resulted in no harm should be countered with the kind of venom I wouldn't hurl at anything but a cranky computer.

Joanne in Cleveland, who talks cautiously to strangers