I sat in my parked car yesterday morning, waiting for my father and sister to come out of the Meals on Wheels building. My father has been volunteering at Meals on Wheels one a week for 7 years. He delivers hot and cold meals to the incapable. I like to brag about his charitability. It makes me sound like a better person.
I put my foot on the dashboard and checked Facebook on my I-Phone. I didn’t have any new notifications. I checked my Instagram, Twitter, g-mail, AOL mail, and the statistics of my blog. All notifications dry as a bone. I took a picture of myself smiling and texted it to 10 friends from my contact list. I do this to be random and silly. But if I die tomorrow, I imagine they would post the picture on social media sites with the caption, “Look how happy she was yesterday”.
I looked out the window. There was a white van parked across the street. Three men were standing at the trunk, taking out their blue Meals on Wheels food coolers. They were having a good time. All three of them jumped up and down laughing, as if the underdog horse they collectively bet on came in first place beating Seabiscut. They spun around in circles, dancing.
I stared at them, squinting in the sunlight. They continued to dance.
It amused me. Their dancing brought a twinge of happiness and curiosity to my soul.
I thought about what I would do if they looked over and saw me staring. I didn’t want to infringe on their personal space, but how could I not stare at three men dancing for no visible reason? The scenario could go two ways.
1) If we made eye contact, I could smile and nod. I could raise my fists in the air and do a fist pumping gesture to show my approval of their dancing. If I did this, I would portray myself as a wierdo.
2) I could just stare, like the picture above. If I just stared and looked away, I would appear to be mean. Even if I enjoyed their dancing and stared, I would come off as a no-fun-having lady. This explains why sometimes shy people come off as unfriendly.
The three dancing men looked my way. We made eye contact. I looked left and right uncomfortably. People think I’m a wierdo anyway, I thought. I smiled and nodded. I did a “raising the roof” gesture with the palms of my hands. They cheered. I shimmied my shoulders. They clapped. I rolled down the window, outstretched my arms and did a body “wave”.
My father and sister emerged with coolers.
I stared at my father and smiled. I whistled to appear non-chalant. I looked at my Iphone.
