She takes shorthand...

Vignette No 9:
She takes shorthand

She is middle aged and overweight. It is hard to tell if she is always smiling, or if her lipstick is applied in a way that looks like a painted smile. She is quick to strike conversation, and as she does her eyes are like laser beams on you. As we talk, I notice that her hands are moving. She is holding a pen and pad and she is scribbling something, but she is not looking at the pad. As the conversation continues, I realize that she is taking shorthand. At this point I am not sure if she is recording our conversation, practicing this anachronistic skill, or what?

The conversation is fluttering around the subject of cities that have an unduly reputation of begin very nice, but in reality they are not that nice at all, as her short-hand scribing continues with no discernible pattern to guess its subject.

As I go through my list of fake-nice cities, I mention a particular city, and her shorthand stops. She asks why do I think that this last particular city is not nice. I realize that indeed, the shorthand was about our conversation, so I decide to open the flood gates of caustic commentary about this particular city, which at this point, I am guessing she is a current resident. I manage to fill the conversation with enough corrosive material to clog her shorthand, turn her lipstick into a frown and to make her excuse herself and leave the area. Now she knows my longhand for “please leave”.