My daughter attended a birthday party last night and instead of going home, twiddling my thumbs, counting down the time until I had to retrieve her, I decided to visit my lovely friend and peer coach at her brewpub. She was working so we had a few moments to chat here and there but for the most part I was sitting alone at the bar, which tends to elicit very interesting, usually unwanted, attention.
The couple sitting directly to my right were married and seemed good natured as they offered to move down a seat to give us more room, which wasn't necessary. After that I tried to ignore their conversation because it was so incredibly dull I'd rather watch paint dry. Then the alcohol must have kicked in because that girl became extremely obnoxious, giving the bartender a hard time for not drinking. "You're Irish and a bartender, you should be drunk all the time!" she stammered. He explained that got him into trouble and he's now completely sober, assuring her he still enjoys life and doesn't miss it. "I want to believe you, but I don't. I don't even know what I'll do when I get pregnant. I can't NOT drink. I mean, shit. That would ruin my life." Wow. Don't have kids, ever, please. The husband is now trying to hush her but she manages a by-the-way-you're-so-hot-all-these-ladies-at-the-bar-are-gonna-drop-their-panties-for-you before he can get the cup out of her hand and push her away from the bar, apologizing to the bartender.
The bartender asks me if they were friends of mine. I couldn't help the, "HELL NO!" that escaped my lips. I didn't want to be associated with that drama. He asked why I felt that way but I didn't really fell like getting into a discussion about it so I simply shook my head and said, "No thanks." The look I got in return was almost in disgust, as if I was acting like a total snob. It caught me off guard. Was I being too judgmental? My thought processes was interrupted by a tap on my left shoulder.
Two older gentlemen, I'm guessing late 50s, wanted to know if they could ask a question. If they were to give it a go, who would I chose? I told them I wasn't interested in playing this game and went back to nursing my drink, nibbling on some veggies and hummus. "Oh, come on. We're grown men, you won't hurt our feelings or anything. We're just curious!" I tried copping out again but they insisted so I finally said, "Neither. I wouldn't give either of you the time of day." Ahh! I can't believe I just said that! While I was telling the truth, I still don't like to hurt peoples feelings. I felt so mean. Fortunately they laughed it off and asked if I'd be willing to play the game 20 questions with them. Realizing they were not about to leave me alone, I rolled my eyes and obliged.
I was to guess their professions and was granted 20 yes or no questions as hints. Well, I didn't need any. After eyeing them up for about a minute; observing their hands, clothing, demeanor and terrible poker faces; I guessed the one standing was in education, either sales (like a college recruiter) or actually teaching, and the one sitting worked with housing but was most likely supervising and he kayaked for fun. Their jaws dropped. The first was a grade school teacher and the other owned his own home security systems company and rows with his friend every week. I'm generally pretty good at reading people, though a couple have stumped me recently so it was nice to know I haven't lost that ability completely.
Now it was two against one, they had to guess what I did for a living. HA! I was actually pretty flattered by their responses. At first I was a designer working in an architecture firm, a curator at a museum, a yoga instructor, then I was human resources for a large corporation. They speculated I had either two masters degrees and/or PhD so I must be a psychiatrist. Nope, nope, nope. But I liked that I had given off that impression.
This process truly fascinated me, especially the questions they would ask as hints. What does studying on the East versus West coast mean to people? Or if I have kids and how old they are? There's a good chance they were just being nosy, but it was thought provoking nonetheless. If I had shown up wearing something else their opinions would most definitely be different, I even used that factor to draw conclusions. What if I didn't have to pick my daughter up, had a few more drinks and was acting silly? Would I have been viewed like that obnoxious girl from earlier in the night? Why do I care?
I certainly won't lose any sleep over the opinions of people I'll never see again, but it did make me wonder about a few of my closest friends. How have their feelings of/for me changed from when we first met to now? What are my sentiments of them? I'd love to better understand the psychology and sociology behind it.
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