Someone just tried to pick me up in the grocery store by smiling and saying, “Excuse me, you’ll probably laugh at me, but you’re slim and attractive and I was wondering if it would be possible to get a date with you,” and when I smiled back and said, “No thank you,” he said, “Sorry I don’t have white skin” and walked away quickly. Too quickly for me to have responded, and even so, I’m not sure what I would have said.
Do I just chalk this up to a wounded society that contains wounded people and carry on? Was he on some sort of misguided consciousness-raising mission? Should I have said, “Calling a stranger slim is not an appropriate comment, and also no, thank you”?
Honestly, before he finished his sentence I thought he was mentioning slim as a strange lead-in to asking me for help with vegetables, as we were in the produce aisle.
– Anonymous
Location: Whole Foods on Prospect Street in Cambridge, MA
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