Strangers

You may recall that on occasion my mother likes to prune the forest. Today on our outing we saw an older man with a cane and clippers, wading in to a blackberry bramble. He reported that he cuts it back whenever he can. My mom gave him a wide berth, as if he were a bit odd. Later on the walk we ran into two older ladies and my mom  introduced herself by saying, "I'm a white person from Minnesota." They were very gracious--and one of them turned out to be from Minnesota, too.