Making Contact With An Angry Stranger

Just had one of those public transport experiences you sometimes hear about, and I feel emotionally overwhelmed. Guy gets into a crowded tram in track pants and no shirt. Nuggety guy, clearly in trouble, anger oozing out all over the place. He's right next to me, muttering and clenching his fists. I just watch him, wondering what we're dealing with here. Suddenly he takes a wild swing and punches the perspex divider between the seats and the stairs. People jump up and scream. I more or less know what I'm dealing with now, and I put my hand on his shoulder and ask him, hey buddy - what's up. He tells me women, man, women will fuck you up. He smashes his head into the perspex divider, and I can hear the zen in my voice as I tell him, don't do that, don't hurt yourself. He looks at me, we have eye contact. Okay. Don't let them fuck you up, I tell him. He waits for me to elaborate. I'm so calm as I tell him, stay calm and strong in your mind and don't let anyone fuck you up. He softens and asks me what I do for work. I tell him that I make coffee for people and I make them happy and I like making people happy because making people happy is such a cool thing. He tells me I am a cool dude, bro, and we have the first of several handshakes, and we exchange names. We talk some more about our plans for the night. He lashes out again at the door. I tell him seriously mate, stop hurting yourself, it's not worth it. We talk some more and he gets off the tram, asking for my name again. He points at me and tells me, thanks bro. I sit down in the crowded silent tram, and then I just start to feel overwhelmed by what just happened. I just wanted the guy to stop hurting himself. I don't think he was going to hurt anyone else, but who knows. I'm alone on this crowded, now silent tram, processing what just happened. And then all this fucking beauty happened. As people left the tram, they came over to thank me. Thank you for doing that. Thank you. You handled that really well, thank you for keeping us all safe. So yeah, feeling a little emotionally overwhelmed right now.