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Sunday, October 26, 2003 Another Excellent Day For People-Watching Most of us know that judging people by how they look is a bad thing. But people do it anyway and, well, we just have to live with that and wear our clothes and comb our hair accordingly no matter how much we hate it. I dress like a college student. I am a college student so maybe that's not so bad. I'm not as deceptive as those kids who dress like they're going to office-cubicle-world every day. But still you can immediately form a picture in your mind, can you not, when I say I often wear bleach-splattered jeans with holes and a t-shirt with an educational institution logo emblazoned on the front. It doesn't help matters much by the fact that I'm always carrying around a battered bookbag and have my hair cut in a pageboy style because I can't be bothered putting it up. What people do and what they say is of more importance. So it speaks volumes to me when I'm trying to contribute to a conversation but I'm abruptly cut off by another person who just can't exercise her jaw muscles enough. And perhaps it speaks even more of me when I just give up on the conversation and turn to something else. But enough of that. Today was an excellent day for people-watching. I'm sure people would disagree with me--it was perpetually gray all morning and afternoon, not particularly pretty or interesting weather-wise. Some might say that people are inherently like that. If you stop a random person on the street and ask him about his life story, you'd be bored to tears in ten minutes. But I only think that's just the consequence of not everyone being natural storytellers. The first person who struck me as interesting was a thin girl with her hair pulled up. Under her left armpit, she had tucked in a fluffy brown dog who looked as comfortable as can be in that position. It was a lapdog turned armpit-dog. And why would someone carry her dog around town like that? Not too far away was a small boy (eight, nine, or ten) standing beside a dog that was larger than himself. The dog looked like a cross between a rottweiler and an afghan--a huge black power puffball on legs. Two even smaller boys (five or six) dug around in the dirt with branches. In a parking lot, I observed three Indians struggling with large bouquets of flowers. Is there some sort of festival that I am not aware of? The two men were suited up impeccably in Western dress--white shirt, tie, pressed pants. The woman was richly garbed in a gold and red sari--bright, vibrant, could stop traffic. Speaking of traffic, I cannot forget to mention the two gung-ho young men standing on the street corner wearing white t-shirts with the name "DEAN" printed in navy blue. They were waving around political posters and generally trying to call attention to themselves. The drivers, I noticed, gave them no heed and generally zoomed past the traffic lights. Nearby, a young woman sat at a picnic table. She was wearing a shirt that said "UCLA" and she was gabbing non-stop into a cellphone. [posted by S. Y. Affolee on 12:57 PM : ]
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