The Nicest, Most Polite Blind Person I Have Ever Met
This is another one of my favorite all-time stories, but unlike most of my funny stories that take place in bars, this one didn’t even involve alcohol.
I want to say that the following events took place sometime around 2008, shortly after we had introduced our Tech Tours program through the Capital Area IT Council. Tech Tours was the brainchild of my friend and former colleague Kate Snyder. The idea behind Tech Tours was that we would try to stave off this mass exodus of IT talent leaving our community, specifically all of these computer science and computer engineering majors who were moving out of state after graduation, by getting them off campus and showcasing all of the different opportunities that the Greater Lansing area had to offer to them as young professionals. Of course, what made Tech Tours such a success is that we also had the awesome support of our economic development and education partners, namely people like my friend Andrea Binoniemi who worked for the Lansing Economic Development Corporation at the time and oversaw their talent retention initiative called “Linking Lansing & U”, as well as all of the great people I used to work with over at MSU Career Services – folks like Kelley Bishop, Garth Motschenbacher, Eric Doerr, Jennifer Jennings, Theda Rudd and many others. We would pick up a group of MSU students on a Friday afternoon and take them around to three or four IT employers, tour some sort of trendy housing option like Stadium District or the Motorwheel lofts, and then we’d end up at a local restaurant or bar where we would invite the participating employers to join the students for some informal networking. Tech Tours embodied the whole “live, work, play” themed experience, back before placemaking, and walkable, livable communities, and all of these other catchy marketing ploys designed to grab the attention of the elusive millennial generation were being bantered around.
I don’t remember what other places we stopped at on this particular tour, but the most important fact is that we ended up at a restaurant in downtown Lansing called Tavern on the Square. Couple of things before I go any further. For those of you who have lived in the Lansing area long enough to remember, or for those who maybe weren’t around back in 2008, the Tavern on the Square I am referring to here, was the original location on the west side of Washington Square where the new Edmunds is currently located. I’m not sure it is still this way, but the original Tavern on the Square had this super cool, unique feature: an industrial looking staircase that went up to this semi-private mezzanine overlooking the dining area down below.
When we first arrived, our group made its way upstairs to the space that had been reserved for our networking event. After making a few announcements, thanking our employer partners and sponsors, I invited the students and employers to network with one another while everybody helped themselves to the ample food and drink set out by our host. Once I felt that I had things under control, I decided it would be a good time to sneak away and use the restroom since we had been on the go since about noon. I made my way over to the staircase and as discretely as possible, began my descent down to the main level in search of the restroom.
Now, like most old buildings in downtown Lansing, I knew that the restroom would likely be located in the back of the building, near the restaurant’s kitchen, away from the storefront facing out onto Washington Square. Like a man on a mission, I bee lined it for the back of the restaurant – that is, until I encountered the proverbial fork in the road as I came upon the restaurant’s bar which was perfectly centered in the space, jutting out from the back wall. At this point I knew I had a 50/50 chance of guessing correctly. So I flipped an imaginary quarter, threw caution to the wind, and slowly started making my way around the edge of the bar to try the right side.
As I passed the corner of the bar I straightened myself out and walked forward, attempting to maintain equal spacing between the bar stools on my left and what appeared to be several booths along the wall on my right. Since I didn’t have my cane with me, and because I had taken off by myself and was going solo at this point, I was probably more cautious than usual, which meant that I was likely moving at about half my normal walking speed.
As I continued, up ahead I caught a glimpse of another person walking toward me. I took another three, maybe four steps before thinking that I maybe should wait before I collide into this guy, so I abruptly stopped just as he did the same thing. I stood there motionless for several seconds in this awkward stare down with this other patron, both of us waiting for the other to make the next move. Finally, I broke the silence, motioning to him with my arm and saying, “go ahead”. But when he didn’t move, I figured he must have been doing the same thing, wanting me to go instead. I took another half a step forward just as he did the same thing, as we found ourselves in this sort of chivalrous game of chicken, one of those, “please sir, go ahead” (no, after you, I insist” type moments, where no matter how hard we tried, we just couldn’t get into sync. I finally acquiesced to the stranger’s noble gesture, as I realized that there was no way this guy was going to just let me stand there while he waltzed on by. It wasn’t until I begrudgingly took another couple steps forward, and then had to awkwardly slam on the breaks, did I realize I was about to crash into my own reflection in a full-length mirror mounted on the back wall of the restaurant.
Normally I might have been able to play this sort of thing off, but just as I struck my defensive ninja pose in response to the close encounter with my reflection, I glanced over to my immediate right and sensed a couple of people sitting there in the back-corner booth. At most, they were maybe three feet away from me, probably close enough to hear the surprised gasp that surely escaped from my mouth, and definitely close enough to see what I’m certain was pure shock on my face as I rushed to avoid a head-on collision of my own making. So no, there was absolutely no chance that I did all of this without being detected. To avoid any further embarrassment, I did a quick 180 and started back the way from which I had just came. By the time I made it to the restroom and was standing at the urinal, I was giggling uncontrollably to myself, which, in and of itself, must have made me seem like a crazy person to anyone who would have happened to be in the bathroom.
All that was going through my head was what these poor people sitting in that back-corner booth must have been thinking about when trying to process what they had just witnessed. They’re sitting there having a nice quiet dinner or maybe sipping on some cocktails, when this goofy-looking guy comes walking up super slow, practically tip toeing. He stops there next to their booth but doesn’t acknowledge them. Instead, he calls out to his reflection in the mirror, does this weird half step/false start looking move, lunges forward only to awkwardly jerk his torso and head back, before pausing a moment to compose himself, and eventually turning around and walking away without any explanation whatsoever. They must have been like, “what the hell was that all about?”
I wish I could have heard the conversation that must have ensued right after I had walked away. My guess is that they probably figured I was completely wasted, but I often wonder what must have been going through their minds. But like many of my escapades, the unknowns just contribute to the legend and lore of these stories that just seem to keep getting better and better with time. It’s been more than ten years now, and I still crack up telling people that story, the night I ran into the nicest, most polite blind person I have ever met!
Post-Script
When I was preparing this blog post and doing some of my routine fact-checking, you know, because I’m writing about stuff that took place more than ten years ago, I reached out to my friend Andrea Binoniemi to confirm that the original Tavern on the Square was indeed located on the west side of Washington Square. Here is how our exchange of text messages went:
Chris: “Hey, I have a question for you. Do you remember what side of Washington Square the original Tavern on the Square was located? Do you know what is in that building now?
Andrea: “Sorry Chris, busy afternoon. The original Tavern is open again and now called Edmunds. It’s on the west side of the street.”
Chris: “Cool, that’s what I thought. Well at least the part about it being on the west side of the street. Had no idea that it was now Edmunds. Thanks.”
Andrea: “I was there this week and I have good news. They did not restore the mirrors on the non-hallway side of the dining room. Basically rolled out the welcome mat for you!”
Like they say, you just can’t make this stuff up.