catcall

Oh No You Didn't

No you did NOT just sit next to me on the bus. Oh no oh NO you didn't.

It's Monday. It's cold. I have a new Vanity Fair and I want to read it. Dread of going to work is at all time high levels. And what do you do? You plop down in the empty seat that was meant to hold my bag or maybe just air and pitch us both into the smothering pergatory of polite bullshit chit chat about nothing. NOTHING. I don't care what you did this weekend. And I highly doubt you care what I did. But we go there - oh boy do we go there - and trade disinterested banter back forth the way workers at McDonalds say "Have a nice day": they don't mean it. Yes, we are aquainted sort of, but not well and certainly not personally. THERE IS A REASON FOR THAT.

When there is an empty seat on a bus or a train or a plane or at a food court or in a book store beside a person with whom one is aquainted but not at "friend" level status, I think it is all of our own responsibility to exercise restraint. Practice the fly by. Smile and keep on walkin'. Refraining from the walk-over-sit-down-make-yourself-at-home interaction is a sign of true social awareness and really deserves a shout out. Walking by someone you just barely know and have nothing in common with is NOT exhibiting bitchiness...it's merely a sign of mercy, of saying "Let's just not waste 3 minutes of our life that we will never get back again, shall we?"

Duck behind that tall guy at the newstand. Hide behind the mountain of apples at Whole Foods. Hang a sharp left down Aisle 9, even if it's the parrot food aisle and you don't have a parrot. Or just go to the damn bathroom but do what you have to do to avoid becoming the roadkill that gets scraped off the pavement after Overly-Friendly and Oblivious crash into one another head on. Don't be that guy. Flee. And fast.

posted by gracegow @ 11:21 AM