I guess I've been a bit of a hermit for the past four months, living a fairly isolated life based from my livingroom couch. I've had the advantage of being able to control my social environment and, for the most part, who is around me.
So I was in for a shock in the last couple of days as I commuted to work with the great unwashed. I have forgotten what it is like to be in an environment where the confines of social norms are, indeed, for the greater good. People are very kind to me ... they hold doors, they offer to help, they dodge out of my way once they see me. But so many people are living on some planet where an awareness of other people, and what should and should not be done in public, are totally foreign to them.
There was music chick - her iPod was so loud that we could hear the words to the song from across the train. And her taste in music was pretty lousy.
There was distingished gentleman - who agreed with me that if we could hear her music, it was too loud. An affable and reasonably attractive, very well dressed, mid-40s guy. But when he got distracted by his blackberry he started to chew his nails. Ugh (but at least it was his fingernails)
There was space-invading sleeper man - the old guy who was leaning over into my space, couldn't get through a page of his magazine without falling asleep and his snoring kept waking himself up. I didn't notice the drool until he got up to leave.
There was the guy who went bolting off the train to run to his car ... parked in a handicapped spot.
I had forgotten this part of the human experience, and I can't say I missed it.
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