As I was running along Juniper Road in the glorious 45-degree weather this past weekend - and no that is not sarcasm - something very strange happened. Well, strange to me at least. In the middle of track seven on my playlist, a quick beep-beep managed to wrestle its way within the notes of the song. After realizing the noise was external-R.Kelly's "Ignition (Remix)" was further down on the list - I looked elsewhere to find the origin of the sound. By the time I had identified its source, the large silver vehicle from which it had originated had already long whizzed past me. In a moment of self-consciousness I immediately glanced down at my feet to make sure I hadn't veered onto the road. After quick inspection I had verified that I was, indeed, entirely on the sidewalk. So, why the honk?I asked a friend about this, and he informed me that it was likely an overt and calculated display of masculinity. "It was definitely a guy," he said matter-of-factly. "Consider it a pick-up line on wheels."I am a firm believer that there are just some things that simply cannot be comprehended across gender lines. It's a known fact that men teem with countless inexplicable enigmas. However, this may just be the most puzzling I've encountered in quite some time.How exactly did this potential suitor want me to respond to his 50 mile-an-hour advances? Perhaps I should have tossed my iPod into the adjacent bushes, thrown my arms in the air and frantically sprinted toward the bumper of my prospective love's Ford Explorer. Had he carefully etched his screen name onto the dust of his rear window? Or maybe he had hoped I would be prepared for such an incident with a pencil and paper, ready and eager to record the rapidly-vanishing license plate - which was now a good 20 feet in the distance - for future reference.The more I thought about it, the more I failed to uncover an ounce of rationale. Of course I was reading into the situation far too much, as females generally tend to do, but for the remainder of that run all I could do was try to piece together the logic non-existent in the gesture. It wasn't that I was offended by the apparent chauvinism. And I wasn't even annoyed by the obvious interruption. I guess I was just dumbfounded. But while there are many things about males that perplex me, I'm sure there is an equal amount of attributes unique to females which garner the same reaction from the other sex. Why would somebody wear Eskimo boots with a skirt? Or find it necessary to have "moral support" when using the lavatory? Better yet - why would somebody put this much forethought into the simple toot of a car horn?
