I remembered a trolley collector, who was actually quite nosy, asking me why I thought people were being rude to me. I hadn't really taken much notice, but he said that I overshared things. I happen to know that this guy was removed from his position because of things he was doing and he told me some stories that, quite frankly, were nonsense. He said to me, "Listen to the pitch in people's voices." I can't always pick it up, and I HATE superficial talk. One day, with this guy, I was talking to someone else, about something that was none of his business, and he came along and asked what we were talking about. The person I was talking to said that he annoyed her because she worked in a nearby shop and had an agreement that she could have a trolley to collect and transport the newspapers (it was a newsagent) into the shop early Sunday morning, but this trolley collector would come in and take the trolley back. That, I found, is one of the negatives of living in a small town, everybody knows everybody else.

I have had a hell of a lot of trauma in my life, too.