Snoozing problems away
ZZZzzz…
There have been three moments in my life where I have seen this deviation tactic used with such skillful talent. In two of the three occasions, the story did not end happily.
The first time was more than two decades ago. We were riding on an overnight train from Salzburg to Florence. My husband and I were in a cabin alone when suddenly, after a stop in Venice, a large group of gigantic prostitutes got on with their wigs bleached, their spandex micro-skirts. Three of those enter our cabin and sit near the door. “Dormi, signorina,” the pack leader kept telling me while they held the door close. Suddenly, the carabinieri came in, and the three women pretended to be asleep. The policeman had no patience and kept telling them that pretending to be asleep would not work. After a few moments, when we hardly breathed, the three women stood up and ran out of the cabin. The policeman entered the following cabin where the same plot was reenacted, but at that time, the three prostitutes stood up and surrounded the carabinieri with their 6ft tall bodies and started punching him. Reinforcements were there a minute later, and the train suddenly stopped in the middle of nowhere, where we saw a group of at least twenty women of the night being kicked off among shouts and a ton of bad Italian swear.
The second time was a few weeks ago. The location: a morning train ride from New York City to Connecticut. The conductor started asking for tickets when a young guy, high as a cloud and sitting two roads before us, pretended to be asleep. The conductor pushed him and tried to move him before warning him she would call the police. As soon as we stopped at the first station, three police officers got on the train, their guns hanging on their belts. The guy knew he had no more excuses, and he got peacefully escorted out of the train.
The third time is the charmer, they say. The location was a lot more familiar, and stationery: home. I entered the foyer and found the dogs hiding and a sticky mess on the floor. I lifted my voice - or screamed, however, you want to call it- to a certain almost-four-year-old. “Leo, what did you do? What is this mess?” The boy jumped on the sofa, laid on his back, closed his eyes, and started snoring. No more screams after that while I hid my laugh.
Several lessons were drawn from these three situations: 1. Pretending to be asleep to escape a sticky situation only works 1/3 of the time. 2. Being a conductor can deplete someone’s patience really quickly. 3. American police look a lot scarier than their Italian counterparts. 4. Prostitutes in Venice are really, really tall. 5. The sleeping technique is a universal tactic 6. If you want to evade your responsibility by pretending to be asleep, you’d better be very cute.