What is Ironic about the narrator's encounter with the blond man in Invisible Man

The narrator plays the part of the tool or the puppet so many times that he is driven to bump strangers on the street, as in the case of the blond man, simply in order to recognize his own existence in their eyes. Yet, in the case of the blond man he fails as well and runs away in the dark as he will do time and time again during the novel. Ironically, the blond man neglects to react to him at all.