#lifecapturedproject // recall the last conversation you had with a stranger.

The last conversation I had with a stranger was yesterday morning. While my daughter was napping, there was a sound at my door, like someone was flapping the letterbox, but in a way that made me know it was not the postman or someone delivering the local newspaper. I opened the door to find an elderly gentleman standing there - he looked as old as 90 - perhaps even older than that. He politely asked if he could help himself to the brass pipe that was attached to our old hot water tank, that was sitting on our drive, waiting to be taken to the dump. I was intrigued and impressed that he had thought to knock on the door to ask if he could have some of our rubbish. I smiled and said, 'yes, of course! Please feel free to help yourself - we're just going to throw it away.' It's very true that one man's rubbish is another man's treasure. He said thank you, I closed the door and left him to it.

Twenty minutes or so passed, and I opened the front door to put something in our car. Much to my surprise, the elderly gentleman was still there, trying to remove the brass pipe. I don't think it was as straightforward as he had hoped, and I don't think he actually managed to get the pipe that he had hoped. I wish I had offered him some assistance in the form of a tool that might have helped him. So there we go, a slightly random and short conversation with a stranger. I wonder if I will see him again.

Prior to that, the last conversation I had with a stranger was in the laundry detergent aisle in Costco. She was swooning over her favourite scent of fabric softener, so I couldn't help but spark up a conversation with her about my favourite fragrances, since she was clearly a fellow lover of all good laundry scents.