There are two middle-aged women that sit at the same table as me in my anthropology class. They’re very friendly, if not a little outspoken and awkward, but in general I enjoy them because it’s nice to not be the only person in my group talking during our group discussion time.
Today in class, one of the women popped a Tupperware out of her backpack. Inside was an entire brick of jack cheese, which she proceeded to unwrap. She then pulled a knife (a knife…like what you stab people with) and began slicing the cheese into cubes. I expected her to transition into a Julia Child-esque monologue in which she would explain the origins of Jack Cheese and then show the whole class how to make a grilled cheese sandwich with it. Nope, she just cubed the cheese, put it back in the Tupperware, and slipped it back into her backpack like there was nothing strange about it. Still confused, I glanced at the other woman to see if she had reacted at all. She hadn’t—but that was probably because she was busy clipping her fingernails.
Did I mention this was in a public place, not over the garbage can in her bathroom at home?
I was so disgusted, I probably would have excused myself from class if I hadn’t been 2 minutes away from giving a presentation. I immediately remembered my trip to the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC a few years ago, where I came across a girl clipping her toenails on a bench in the middle of the Auschwitz exhibit and had to walk quickly in the opposite direction and keep myself from thinking about the toenail clippings that were surely sprinkled on the floor like confetti.
I don’t know what the deal is, but some people just have no common courtesy or perception of public manners. I don’t care what you do at home. Feel free to leave your toenail clippings all over the couch, eat food that you dropped on the floor, and slurp your soup as loud as you like. As long as I’m not there to put up with it, I don’t care. But please, guys, can we all show a little more consideration toward the people around us when we’re in public?
Last Friday I was at a concert at the state fair. There was a teenage girl sitting next to me, and halfway through the show, she decided to put her sweater on. So she flung her arm out, barely missing my face, and proceeded to take up all of my personal space to put her arm in the sleeve. I was too shocked to verbalize my annoyance; I simply looked from her to my friend and back again with the “would you believe this girl?” look, hoping she’d get the hint. Spoiler alert: She didn’t. She just wielded her arm around my head until she had finished putting the sweater on and then turned back to the concert as though nothing had happened. That time, I didn’t do anything about it. Looking back, though, I wish I had turned to her and said, “excuse me, will you kindly remove your hand from my face?”
Maybe this is purely out of selfishness that I’m asking for this—after all, if these things didn’t affect me, I wouldn’t be nearly as passionate about it. But this is something I think everybody can agree upon. Cube your cheese before you go to school. Remember the concept of personal space. And for goodness sake…stop clipping your nails in public!
