What a hectic few days it's been. The road trip was nice, it wasn't as jam-packed photo wise as I thought it would be, but I got a few nice shots and the headspace did me wonders. Funny how a break from the norm can do that.
Today was weird though. It had me scratching my head a bit. I was in the waiting room as I had an appointment with the doctor and there were other people around, some small talk here and there, people on their phones and what-not.
A lady and her little boy were sitting between me and what I assumed another female on the other side of her. They were chatting a bit and the lady with her son was knitting (or trying to knit) something in between the conversation. I was interested in what she had started so when there was a break in their conversation I asked her. She said she wasn't actually knitting anything, she was just doing it to stay busy because she hates waiting and her son had her phone (he was watching Bluey).
I nodded and said I understand the frustration with waiting, that I used to take my knitting with me for this exact purpose but every time I'd get into it, I'd be called up and if you're following a pattern, it can become more trouble than it's worth. I then apologised for interrupting their conversation and it resumed.
This wasn't the weird part for me. The weird part happened next.
The childless person was asking her all sorts of rather personal questions. What is her name, how old is she, where does she live, does she live alone or with family, where did she grow up, where did she go to school, did she enjoy her studies and so on and so forth. I started to get the feeling that the young mum was feeling a bit uncomfortable with the questions and I noticed she started to dodge many of them. Even I started feeling uncomfortable at this point. It didn't really seem like small talk. "It's been really cold lately right?" would have seemed appropriate.
The person then disclaimed that she identifies as transgender and asked if the young mum would like to exchange phone numbers.
At this point I started paying closer attention and watched the interaction in my peripheral vision. The knitting mum started squirming in her seat and asked the person "What for?" The response was "Oh, you know, just to chat".
There was a bit of hesitation and then
"No, as a mum, I don't really have time to connect with people, I don't really go out much and there's hardly ever even time to spend with my own friends. I don't really just "chat" with people I don't know and I'm really bad at keeping in contact generally".
This was (in my opinion) a perfectly good and polite answer - no.
I mean, apart from the fact that this person was trying to pick up what I assumed to be a straight female (having a son and all) in a doctor's waiting room which is in itself rather odd, they persisted.
"Can I give you my number and if you want to chat...you know?"
At this point my name was called and as I walked past them I looked at the young mum and said "yay, that means you'll be called soon too" with a smile. If my name hadn't been called at that point I was planning on trying to intervene with my own conversation topic which didn't include exchanging phone numbers or personal questions.
I felt bad for her, but I could tell that even though she was uncomfortable, she was standing her ground. There is just no way I can understand how this interaction seemed even remotely normal. Hey, maybe I'm just weird or really old fashioned, but I've never ever had someone try to pick me up in a doctor's office waiting room. The fact that this happened in front of a 4 year old is also a bit weird in my opinion.
How about you? What do you think of this interaction and had it been you, what would you have done? What was the weirdest place someone tried to pick you up?
𝑷𝒓𝒐𝒖𝒅𝒍𝒚 𝑨𝑰 𝒇𝒓𝒆𝒆. 𝑨𝒍𝒍 𝒊𝒎𝒂𝒈𝒆𝒔 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝒘𝒓𝒊𝒕𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒂𝒓𝒆 𝒎𝒚 𝒐𝒘𝒏.