The Meet Cute that Wasn't

Seoul is hot in May. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise, because they're either a liar or a very good friend of mine who shivers in hot tubs. Either way, insane.

As I said, Seoul is hot in May. Or at least, it was last time I was there. The trip had been incredible, a whole collection of new friends to explore a strange place alongside.

Then they left, our group tour over, and I walked away from them in the damn-near torrential rain, orange umbrella overhead, and both bags around my shoulders. I imagined a story as I walked, one about a man wandering off into the rain to never be seen again. It was a hopeful story, if a little sad.

Of course, many of the ones I tell are.

In another life, it sometimes seems to have happened. To another person. But I know it was me, because I know how I changed as a result. One further problem with living an examined life, your delusions are few but those that exist powerful. I know I was there, I know it happened to me, even if at times the whole sequence almost recalls like something I read in a book.

Exhausted from the physical and social rigors of the trip, I cut my final day's wandering short. What wonders I had managed to find, including a preserved temple complex. Alas, it was the end, my feet ached, and my back was stiff from the hundred plus kilometers I had walked.

Sadly, for me, the crowds were dense, the sun hot, and the clouds absent. It baked down on us, the kind of humid heat that is only really possible after centimeters of rain over the course of two days.

Barely at a shuffle, working my way through the press and into the blessed share of towering buildings, I paused briefly to examine a street cart. Grilled meats were tempting, but I saw nothing to drink and so turned away, there were other cheaper meals to be had.

And that was when I saw her.

Careening is an exageration I employ with greatest care. She was careening towards me, weaving her classic lady's bike between stunned and scattering pedestrians. I couldn't move back, there was a press of humanity behind me. And I only noticed her when it was too late.

Her right handle bar clipped my wrist, just above my watch and the paper braclet from a museum. Pain flared, but a dull and distant one. She slowed, nearly stopping and looked back at me over her shoulder. Just for a moment. Then she was gone.

I can see her clearly, though. A person or two between us, her thick black skirt and blue jacket seeming impractically warm to me. Weight leaned to one side as though she might alight from her bike and check on me. That would have been the protagonist's action.

A round face with hair cut so as to frame it and eyes wide with surprise. Dark eyes. White shirt beneath the blue jacket, pearly buttons catching stray flashes of sunlight.

Were I a more ficitonal man, that might have been something. Were I a more fictional man, I might now be returning for an audience demanded second season. Were I a more fictional man, that would have been a moment to change my life.

Rather, she saw that I was unharmed though grasping my wrist, and accelerated away from me. At the time, I can remember only that I thought she was rude. I mean, she had hit me and didn't even stop to ask if I was hurt.

The impact of my wrist actually sent her off course (yes I take pride in that. Monkey strong) and there was no way of knowing it was not me wom she had hit. The surrounding crowd, forming almost a standing amphitheater with us at its centre could only have demonstrated that.

For the briefest moment, looking back on it, I knew what it was to be the second half of a story. Only in reflection can I see the true narrative power of that moment. Had a different choice been made, perhaps things would have turned out differently. It is certain they could have turned out worse.

Considering that I don't speak Korean and have little personal understanding of how international health insurance works, I think that any injury beyond a few drops of blood was well avoided.

Had such an event taken place at home, in the polite and broadly considerate part of Canada in which I live, it would have gone differently. Were certain things reversed and I instead a Korean in Canada where a pretty girl hit me with a bike, odds are she would have stopped. Odds are that nothing would have happened beyond a brief and awkward confirmation of my not being hurt.

But still, I would never get the chance to find out. She departed, as she had every right to do given that I wasn't actually hurt much. And I was left standing there, watching her go with something like disappointment and surprsie at the rudeness.

Now, however, I look back with the extreme wisdom and long-beardedness of two extra years and think, "what an interesting how I met your mother that would have been."