You Know You Live In Brooklyn When...

In honor of my recent first anniversary...

* You are on your way to a dinner party and silently pray that there is something to eat there besides vegetable/vegan side dishes. This is my own fault because I always volunteer to bring dessert and should instead volunteer to bring steaks. I probably only eat red meat twice a month, but stuff that is too trendy makes me revolt. Clarification- I don't care if you are vegan, just don't assume that eating grass is everyone else's dream come true.

* Everyone you know thinks that the Great American novel is lying dormant in their brain, if only they had enough free time to write it. Including you.

* If you go too far south, you look around the bus and realize that you are probably the only person whose mother spoke English to them in the cradle. And if you are too blonde, disoriented Babushkas constantly ask "Говорите ли вы Россию?" (Do you speak Russian?). When you shake your head, they despondently try to figure out the subway map.

As a side note, if I were a sociologist, I would be interested in doing a study on what makes people approachable in these situations. I can't leave my house for more than an hour without being asked for directions at least once. One time, my friends were amazed because three people approached me within ten minutes. My theory in my case is that there is some kind of societal archetype that equates fairness with innocence and that I am not pretty enough to intimidate people and not ugly enough to repulse them.

* You experience a glimmer of hope when you see first time moms who are old enough to be the grandmother of a 10-year-old in Utah.

* When you go to the local women's gym, half of the ladies are working out in long skirts (including jean) and have traded in their wig for a headscarf. Actually, my mom is going to Israel and has been trying in vain to find long skirts that are actually cute. Does anyone have any ideas? She read somewhere that fundamentalist Christians wear jean skirts (like the Duggars?), so that is not an option. Someone in my family was watching that 17 and Counting show while I was at my parent's house one summer and it led me to study the Quiverfull movement for several days. I support people's right to do whatever they want, but if you are going to homeschool your kids, please have some schooling past high school.

* When your friends tell you what they studied in graduate school and how much debt they have, you silently congratulate yourself for being an autodidact (that is the most pretentious word I could come up with, haha) with a specially designed curriculum of youtube documentaries and Wikipedia. Don't get me wrong, I am 100% for advanced degrees if you are employable or you have lots of money to burn. However, if you are 100k in debt from studying French feminist milkmaids in 19th century Lyon and now work in a call center, you do not have my sympathy.

* People in Manhattan constantly invite you to school night stuff that would require a three hour round trip subway ride (I live pretty far south in Brooklyn), but would think it was preposterous to even meet you in north Brooklyn. Defriend.

* Sometimes you are getting dressed and put on something that doesn't quite match, because it is comfortable. You are confident that you will still look more put together than 95% of the people in your demographic, because at least your hair is clean and your eyes are unglazed.

* You are with friends on the street and a strange man approaches and launches into a monologue about the mathematics of local architecture. In the middle of his impassioned discourse, he starts rolling something and begins to smoke it. You are too embarrassed to ask your friends later if it was a joint, because you are 30 years old and should be able to recognize one (you are not with Mormons, who would be more empathetic or not know either). However, you introspectively analyze your mood to see if there was a residual effect. You are kind of chill in general, so hard to say.

* Strangers engage you in conversations about your reading material.
Best Bait

Atlas Shrugged: Carry this around New York for a few days if you need to make new friends, because there is always someone available to tell you that it changed their life. My cousin once toyed with the idea of naming her daughter Dagny, so the influence of this book cannot be underestimated.

Confessions of an Economic Hitman: This one wins for luring in random men in Park Slope-five different yippies approached me within two hours. This was not my intention and as I wanted to drop kick the narrator after approximately 50 pages, I knew that I was not dealing with kindred spirits. I don't disagree with the idea that American development aid has an evil side, but he was so self righteous and condescending that it obscured his argument. I think that you can acknowledge our detrimental foreign policies without demonizing the American people or making us all sound like uncultured simpletons who can't find Iraq on a map.

My Hope for Peace by Jehan Sadat: I ended up having an hour long convo with some Jordanian guy in Central Park because he saw it in my hands. Orhan Pamuk books do the trick also.

Spanish books: These convos are not about the books; people just see that you know Spanish and decide to start chatting you up. The last time I read a book in Spanish, this Peruvian guy regaled me with an implausible tale about the ghost of his neighbor haunting his apartment building.