An Ethical Dilemma

Okay, here goes. What is one's obligation to be nice to the creepy guy at church? It's church, so there's that whole "don't be judgmental, doing unto others" thing. But there's someone at my church who is essentially chasing me out of the coffee hour each week. Unfortunately, I don't have someone else there that I know well enough to act as my wingman/interference person.

First, let me say that it's clear the guy is mildly "not right". I don't know if it's Aspergers, mild diminished mental capacity or what. This factor also adds slightly to the dilemma. The church we go to is Episcopalian, and the home of "I'm okay, you're okay, please pass the gin-and-tonic". Not a hotbed of holy rollers, by any means, and I suspect the associate rector may be gay but no one would ever be so crass as to bring it up. This guy comes in and is always lifting his hands and bible in the air in the "hallelujah" pose during the services -- nothing wrong with that, but it's always out of place in this crowd. In any case, afterwards in coffee hour, I'm usually trying to give the Boy a little bagel or cheese or something, so we sit down to eat. This guy comes over (and he's one of those that doesn't have the right sense of personal space -- he always comes just a little too close) and just kind of stands there. He then tries to coochie-coochie the Boy, who unfortunately tends to smile back. (I've got to start pinching him). However, he then just stands there indefinitely or brings up really inappropriate stuff and doesn't understand what my non-answers mean.

For example, today it was "Where do you live". "Oh just up the street". "Can you write me a check? If you live here you must be rich" [See yesterday's blog for context]. "No." "What do you do that you're so rich?" "I work for the government". "Oh is it secret? What department? What do you do?" "Oh, I'm a manager" (And yes, at this point my internal dialogue is strongly going with the "Go away you ass-wipe" themes). "Do you know any secrets?" "No." "If you did, would you tell the press? " "No." "Why not?" "Because they're secrets. " At this point, I'm continuing to also say "oh, must get the boy home for his lunch" and finally just walk away and leave.

Now in most other settings, I'd tell him off. But this is church, he comes each week, and one or two other people have said he's harmless, which I suspect may be true. I don't really get asshole vibes, just extreme social disjointedness (again, I'm betting it's Aspergers). But I really am tired of running away from coffee hour, and even when I'm talking to someone else he comes over, and of course the other people scoot away fast, so I'm left there. I do sometimes border on the semi-rude by simply saying goodbye and walking over to something else, but I really want to just tell him to leave us alone.

So what would you all do?

And a minor non-related rant. Yesterday I was out at the grocery store and parked in the "expectant mothers/parents with infant" space was a teeny scooter ("Ciao", as Eddie would say). I was so annoyed. There's no way anyone nine months pregnant was on that thing, and there ain't no room for a baby seat either. I really wanted to stick around tell that person off, and was mildly tempted to pick up the scooter and deposit it somewhere else. I rarely bring the boy to the store, but when I was grossly pregnant with sciatica boy did I need that space, and it was taken up at least two-thirds of the time. I'm sure that person was very, very, very special and important, but still an asshole.

*ETA -- and a hearty eff-off to Youtube for putting ads in the videos.