A stranger gave me his ticket at the gate and would not take my money

New Year's Eve, 1995, no ticket, twenty-two years old, forty dollars in my pocket and an entirely unearned confidence that it would work out.

It did not appear to be working out. Doors were closing. I was doing the finger-in-the-air thing, feeling increasingly like a person in a costume.

A guy maybe fifty, wool coat, completely unremarkable, walked up and handed me a ticket. I got my forty out. He put his hand over mine and pushed it back down and said "someone did this for me in '89" and walked away toward the subway. He did not go in. I have thought about that for thirty years — he had a ticket and he left.

I've given away eleven tickets since. I say the same line. I've never told anyone it isn't mine.