She’s in the middle of telling me a story about an Instacart employee who was friendly but had a naive quality about her. “You know, one of those young people without a lot of life experience,” she says, then asks, “What are you, about thirty-six?”

“Thirty-three?” I tell her.

“Oh wow, you’re the same age as me. Kids?”

“No.”

“No kids?” she asks, almost as though the thought confuses her.

“No, no kids.”

“Significant other?”

“No, I’m single?”

“Single?” Now she sounds like I’ve told her I’m from another planet.

“Yeah, I’m single.”

“Anime?” she asks.

“…Huh?” I ask, not quite getting the question.

“You’re thirty-three, no kids, and single, so… anime?”

“Oh,” I laugh. “No I don’t watch much anime.”

“Star Wars?”

“Star Wars is… okay. It’s fine.”

“John Wick?”

“No, I haven’t seen any of those.”

She stares at me like I’m some sort of anomaly. “So… what, like, what’s your thing? What do you do?”

“I don’t know,” I tell her. “I mean, I write stuff. Novels and screenplays.”

“Ohhhh!” she says, like it all makes sense now.

I don’t ask whether she has kids or a significant other, but if anyone is dating her, I can’t say I envy them.