She first called two years ago.
“Hi Susan Greene. It’s Susan Greene,” said the perky voice on the other end of the phone line. “I read the paper and called to say we’ve got the same name.”
I’ll admit, I found the conversation awkward. What was there to talk about beyond the commonality of our pretty common name?
But she kept at it, calling every few months just to check in.
“Hi Susan Greene. It’s Susan Greene,” she always began.
She filled me in on the birth of her grandbaby. Then came details about her twin nephews’ graduations from Notre Dame. Next followed blow-by-blow accounts of the hot flashes she says prompted her to quit her job at T.J. Maxx, then lose her next job at a warranty service, then wish she’d never left T.J. Maxx in the first place.
Each call was more like hearing from a sister or longtime friend than from a woman I’d never met.
Because of our shared name, Susan Greene took it upon herself to sniff out news topics. At least three of my columns have come from her tips. I’ve vetoed several other ideas, including one about the above-mentioned Notre Dame nephews and another about her cat’s insomnia.
She called on Election Day to say she voted for John McCain but hoped we could be civil to each other anyway.
She mailed me a sudoku book and a box of toffee last year when I was sick.
And she’s always bugging me to lighten up and write columns about glasses that are half-full, not half-empty.
Go find another Susan Greene, I tell her.
Late in the fall, we agreed it was time to meet. She canceled our lunch in December because of a bad roll with emphysema. I canceled a lunch in January when Bill Ritter quit the governor’s race.
Finally, we managed to meet for breakfast halfway between my home in Denver and hers in Adams County. She ordered her eggs over medium. I had mine over easy. We shared stories about our lives and kids, pulling their photos from our wallets and studying each other’s carefully. We laughed for five minutes straight after I walked out of the ladies room with toilet paper stuck to my boot.
Much to my relief, Susan Greene and I had far more interesting things to discuss than our name.
When it was time to go, she looked at me with a heavy seriousness.
“Do you ever not know how to say what you need to say?” she asked.
“Yep,” I said.
She paused, playing with her empty Equal packet.
“My name’s not Susan Greene,” she told me. “I mean, it used to be Susan Greene, but I changed it when I got married and have always regretted the decision .”
She went on to tell about the pregnancy she had too early, the man she married because of it and the decades she spent before realizing she didn’t know who she was any more. At age 56, Susan Somebody Else has a name she says she doesn’t fit and has spent all too long wondering what might have become of Susan Greene if she’d made different choices.
“I was just curious,” she told me. “That’s why I made the first phone call.”
Susan Greene writes Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. Reach her at 303-954-1989 or greene@denverpost.com.
