I was on my way to my local grocery store a few weeks ago to pick up a few necessary items when I heard someone call out from somewhere to the right of me, “Hey girl, let me be your daddy”. Oh boy, I thought gritting my teeth, here we go again. It was 11 am for Gods sake!…From the corner of my eye, I could tell it was a middle aged man in shabby clothing carrying a laundry (?) bag ..I kept walking, neither acknowledging nor looking at the source of this highly unflattering attention…He, being the persevering soul that he was, tried again, in a voice that sounded like he was drunk/stoned, “C’mon baby girl, give me a little smile, pretty please”, eliciting an almost involuntary eye-roll and grimace from me...Bad idea, as this not-so-subtle reaction only served to incense him..”Hey, don’t you be rollin' your eyes at me” he called out, in a menacing tone of voice. Uh-oh..That’s when I reverted to a familiar old habit, my favorite coping mechanism during those moments of anxiety that arise when I am forced to attend a necessary social event where I don’t know anyone, or when I am talking to my crush at a party and we suddenly run out of things to say: Answering the fake phone call or even composing the fake text just to make myself appear preoccupied….As frivolous as it seems, my phone has been my savior during such situations. So, I whipped out my cell phone like it was a weapon and pretended to answer a silent vibrating phone ring knowing that he was too far away to tell if my phone had really rung or not…”Hey! Yup I am on my way… will see you in a minute” I paused, before continuing in panic, trying to sound normal…”btw did you remember to bring the QA report from last time?…I think it will be a good form of reference…Sure I have that with me...” loud enough to be heard but not too loud so as to sound unnatural...I was basically blabbering nonsense, but how the hell would he know?…He muttered something about educated folks and kind of faded away from my line of vision in a few minutes, as I continued walking and fake talking till I was sure he was not around anymore..
Since then, I have found myself resorting to this method everytime I am accosted by a persistent cat-caller on my way to class, grocery store, work, anywhere…and it actually works…In fact it works better than simply ignoring them as some of them simply don’t seem to give up…The fake phone call gives me a good excuse to ignore them, as it seems like I am not paying attention since I am apparently too engrossed in my fake conversation to hear them…So they stop trying. In fact my intuition in this regard has become so fine tuned, like most woman having to face this situation everyday, that I whip up my phone atleast a second or so before I am about to encounter a potential cat-caller, so my sudden phone call seems natural and not manufactured in reaction to them...
So ladies, if you are tired of the especially persistent eve teaser who does not seem to get the message, and you want to look for creative ways to make him leave you alone, the fake phone call does the job beautifully..Of course, I would advice you to make your necessary grocery store trips in the day time, when its well lighted, rather than in the late evening hours or have your friend drive you instead..but you know, it never hurts to have a few tricks up your sleeve, when there is no choice at the time but to walk alone…and ofcourse, have your pepper spray ready in your purses just in case.
No comments:
Post a Comment