StrangerDanger

Lucy and Anabel are a little confused by the whole “stranger danger” idea. Anabel happily yells “Hi! Hello!” to everyone she possibly can. And Lucy thinks that everyone is put on this earth to tell her how cute she is, and if she’s wearing a dress, then they’re suppose to tell her that her dress is “lovely”. She’ll also accept “beautiful”. So I am faced with trying to instill in them a healthy fear of strangers, especially ones that ask them a lot of questions or offer them things. Anabel is okay with telling people no for a ride in the car, but she’s a little iffy on the whole treat/candy offer. She’d take that in a heartbeat. And I can’t even blame them. Nope, not even a little. Because not so long ago, as an adult, I found myself happily perched in a stranger’s van.
They didn’t offer me candy (would have turned that down, flat), but they said the magic words. Words that caused my eyes to glaze over, my heart to pound and my brain to shut down. They whispered them to us as we exited the subway in New York. “Do you want to see some Coach purses?” the lady asked. “Yes!” I cried. “Come this way” she instructed, then quickly turned and walked away. We followed her a couple of blocks, zigzagging through stinky ally ways that made us walk faster and closer to each other, then finally to a less crowded side street. There, parked at the curb was a white, ugly, non-descript van. Mecca, the Promised Land of cheap knock-offs. Danger? Whatever! Shirley and I scrambled to be the first inside, and our heads swiveled, trying to take everything in at once. Joyce hesitated, unsure of what to do, and Shirley and I both spoke at once. “Get in!” we encouraged, anxious to get our hands on the clutches, the handbags, the evening bags and wallets. She finally climbed in and the door slid shut, locking us in with all those tempting bags. Shirley and I immediately got down to business. “I want something in white” I said. “Oooh, white!” Shirley exclaimed. And we were lost. Should we get something small? Impractical and absolutely lovely? Joyce was a harder sell. “What if they kidnap us?” she asked. “What if they…Oooh, I like this purse.” And just like that, rational thought had officially left three adult women. Instead, we oohed and ahhed over colors, fabrics and designs.
The whole experience lasted less than twenty minutes, all told. We escaped unscathed, with purses slung over our shoulders, new wallets happily resting in the bottom of our beautiful new bags. I loved every minute of it and only regret that I didn’t get that sable brown leather number that I debated over. Shirley and I still laugh about how quickly we followed that woman and how eager we were to be the first in the van.
I’m not sure if I should be insulted or just frightened by how easily my mind went blank and I followed a stranger through a strange city to a strange van. All because she offered me something impractical and lovely and not at all necessary. So I guess if you want to lure women to a party, offer them something that will make their eyes glaze with the promise that they’ll look at it and think, “Oooh, shiny!”