It was said that my New York license plates would arouse interest and perhaps questions, since they were the only outward identifying marks I had. And so they did – perhaps twenty or thirty times in the whole trip. But such contacts followed an invariable pattern, somewhat as follows:

Local man: “New York, huh?”
Me: "Yep."
Local man: “I was there in nineteen thirty-eight – or was it thirty-nine? Alice, was it thirty-eight or thirty-nine we went to New York?"
Alice: "It was thirty-six. I remember because it was the year Alfred died.”
Local man: "Anyway, I hated it. Wouldn't live there if you paid me.”

What does this conversation show about the people whom the author meets?