I talk to strangers all the time. People often start up talking to me, but I am just as likely to open the batting. Public transit is the most frequent place (and reason) for a conversation, but the ladies' room at a shopping centre or highway rest stop is a close second.

Normal city life has so many opportunities for a chat. How can one attend a physiotherapy clinic without talking to the other clients? I have a slight but nasty rotator cuff problem at present, and twice a week find myself in a row of fellow sufferers, all young men but me. They think it highly amusing that the "lady of a certain age" plays the guitar, and that hauling a flight case out of the boot of one's car can injure a shoulder badly enough to require six weeks of physio. Grocery shopping -- that's a good one. I am sometimes approached by younger folks who want to know how to cook something, or what to eat with something that is on special, or whether an unfamiliar-looking variant on a normal food is a Good Thing. (Purple broccoli spurred a particularly brisk debate in Loblaw's last week.) Do you drive an old car -- especially one that is not crappy? Expect someone to ask you how old it is, and how you keep it on the road. Do you have a dog? Every day, expect to talk to people about the beast, because hardly anyone will ignore you. I have been known to greet a friendly dog -- "Hello, dog," -- and then, very much as an afterthought, "Hello, human, nice day today."

My husband says I am to talkers as a lightbulb is to moths. I think it is more that I get around on foot and on public transit far more than he does, and I do most of the household hunting and gathering, so I'm more accustomed to sharing space with strangers who are not clients or customers, but just others going about in the world. When somebody looks at me directly, I look back and say Hello. When somebody talks to me, I answer -- just lobbing the ball back over the net. I get a fair few nutters, but also some very interesting acquaintances.

For example, some 15 years ago I met a middle-aged Afghan man at the bus stop one Monday in winter. The next day, he was there again, and the day after that. We started greeting each other, first with a mutual nod, then with "Good morning." I eventually learned that he was attending English classes. I told him that I worked as an editor -- and explained what an editor is. After that, every morning when we met at the bus stop, he had a question about English vocabulary and usage: What is the difference between a hat and a cap? Why are members of the Conservative Party called Tories? Along the way, I learned that English is his fourth or perhaps fifth language, after Pashto, Dari, Urdu, and German -- Hamburg was his family's last stop before Canada on the refugees' Trail of Tears.

If you sit at the front of the bus, the old folks on walkers talk to you. If you sit at the back, the high school kids usually ignore you but eventually somebody wants to know what kind of instrument that is in the case. If it's a guitar, the drunk guy wants you to play a tune. "Hey, honey -- Do you know The Rose?"

I say no, but nicely. No need to add to the world's misery quotient.