Who are you talking to?

This thought occurred to me yesterday as I was walking back to work after lunch with Ina. We had street-meat. And that is why Ina is the *best*.

Anyway, there was this guy talking to himself and I thought he was one of those people on the street who have conversations with themselves. I remember when I was little, sitting at the bus station in Buffalo and there was this African American woman talking to herself. She wasn't overly animated but just sitting two seats away from me, I sat there and listened to her entire spiel, and it was actually quite interesting. In her mind she was speaking to a judge, presenting her case and I remember it being very coherent, almost like she had rehearsed this a trillion times (which probably why she was in her state in the first place). I suspected she was probably very intelligent and just completely lost it after some legal trouble.

These are real people, who just happened to lose a few marbles here and there. But I just remember that time in Buffalo (or was it DC?) when I sat there for 10 minutes waiting for my mom or dad to get us some bus tickets. And when my parent came back they felt protective and pulled me away to keep me from this dangerous person who could lash out at me on any moment's notice.

I guess it's kind of sad the way people are treated just because they are having a conversation with no one around them. Nowadays you see people doing the exact same thing everywhere, only it's completely justified because they have this little piece of plastic stuck in their ear with a blinking blue light on it.