I Think I'm Being Followed

It all started a few days ago. I do not want to tell anyone, as they will think that I am being paranoid, or just plain crazy. I do not think that I am the first, possibly the second for other reasons. I just want this issue to be resolved. On Monday, I had my first ‘vision’ as I now call it while I was walking back home from work as I always do every afternoon. It’s only about three miles between workplace and home and I can do with the exercise. But it is mainly because I like walking, as it is the best stimulus for my thinking processes. I don’t think much when I drive, as I have to concentrate on my driving. My mind can very quickly drift away into thinking far away from driving practicality. I was told that I was hired for my advertising job because of my “creative thinking.” That is both a blessing and a curse. My brain can and often does take me to places to which I do not want to go. My current situation might just be one of those places.

The First Day

How did this all start? I was crossing one of the several roads that I pass by on my way back home from work. I looked to see whether there was a car coming, something I have to consciously remind myself to do when my thoughts are imagining in full flight, which they often are.  I do not want to be a traffic accident martyr to my creativity.  

What I saw was an old woman who suddenly stopped walking, almost falling over forward as she did so. She was staring at me like her eyes were weapons.  I wasn’t wearing anything strange, and my fly wasn’t down.  I am careful to check that when I leave both home and workplace, both preceded by a necessary pee after too much coffee early in the morning and late in the afternoon. Anyway, I don’t think she would be able to see whether it were down or not. She was too far away. But she was definitely staring at me. It was spooky.

I had to tell myself that I should not let my imagination get the better of me. It is a powerful force for good and bad. After all, I had just a week ago written the plot of a television commercial in which the hero had people stare at him as he walked by as he was wearing a new and flashy brand of hat, triangular in shape.  I had the company that made them retrieve the ancient name of tricorn for this new trend.  I wasn’t wearing such a hat this afternoon, although I had done so when I had my picture taken for the local newspaper. I would not ever wear in public the free one they gave me. I don’t like to draw attention when I am trying to think creatively.

The Second Day

The next day, when I was walking back home after work, I looked for the old woman where I had seen her last (as if she would stand in the place all day long just waiting for me, I’m that special). But, of course, I did not see her there. Then, on the next street down the road, I was to see her again. This time she did not stop when she saw me. In fact she sped up into what was probably her highest walking gear. So did I, at a much faster pace. I needed my brain for the next advertisement plan. I very much needed to not be distracted when I was thinking on that subject on my walk home. It was no time or place to be followed by someone, with all the distracting imagination such an event would entail.

The Third Day

Then there was the next day. This time she appeared when she was only two streets away from my house. She was definitely getting closer each day. I didn’t think that she could be a break and enter specialist, or was the front woman for a group of such people, but I still felt like I was being followed for some evil purpose unknown to me. It unnerved me.

I did not tell my wife about any of this. I tried to hide my glances out the window to see if my pursuer was in sight.  Fortunately, Mabel did not appear to suspect a thing. To her I was safe, not being tracked like a wild animal.

The Fourth Day

On the fourth day, as I was nearing home after not seeing my pursuer, she suddenly appeared seemingly coming out of nowhere. The old lady walked up to me, as boldly as she could, and said an amazing, and initially unbelievable thing. “I used to be your mother, Brad. And you used to be my son. I saw your picture in the local paper concerning your crazy advertisements for those equally crazy triangular hats for men. And then I saw you on the street on Monday. I just had to meet up with you.”

“Okay, how does that ‘used to be my mother’ scene work out” I asked her. “I will tell you right now,” she declared. I invited her to sit beside me in one of the two chairs that were on the front lawn.  She told a tale of giving birth to me, and that not long afterwards she and her husband, the man that I knew to be my father, broke up as a married couple. And because he was a lawyer who fanatically didn’t drink, and she was known to have her fair share of alcohol, when they divorced, he was able to have her judged as an ‘unfit mother’. Shortly afterwards he met and married the woman that I had all my life to this point believed was my mother.

The Present

Now both of us, my birth mother Martha, and I have a different kind of walk from my workplace. She does not have to follow me anymore. We often meet outside my office building and walk together. This turned out to be good for several reasons, not just the emotional beauty of becoming closer to my birth mother, and learning about her life both before and after my birth. She had been in advertising too, before she married. She suggested to me that I communicate with the triangular hat people, telling them that maybe old women might make a new and profitable market for them. They quickly bought the idea, and my mother became the star of the local t.v. commercial selling the product, even though she dislikes triangular hats as much as I do.