“If you’re not a teacher, you should be.”

Per usual, the line at the movie theater was outrageously long. I suppose that’s what I get for going to see a movie on a Sunday afternoon, but standing around with forty other people waiting for one of three registers to open so I can order an overpriced Coke is never going to be a pleasant experience, especially when I’m surrounded by families. Worse still, I’m surrounded by children.

My arms are folded and defensive, I may or may not be flexing so the girl in the Paramore shirt can see the muscles I don’t have. Her hair is blue and black, and it looks like she’s there with her boyfriend. “Doesn’t matter,” I think to myself, “I’m miles better looking than that guy.” His hair is dry and curly, a frizzy mop given the humid weather outside. He’s wearing a brown shirt that’s two sizes too big. “At least my clothes fit,” I say to myself, even though it probably looks like I got my shirt from the children’s section of H&M. Whatever.

In the few minutes that I’ve been standing here quietly judging the guy in front of me, the line has moved maybe a few inches. The family in front of us is taking forever to order, and apparently they’re going to order one of everything on the menu. Their final tally comes up to roughly sixty bucks. Sixty fucking dollars for food at a movie theater…Jesus Christ, what kind of society do we live in where that’s even remotely okay?

The future seems dark and relatively hopeless. The line isn’t moving and I’m the only pretty person here. Ugh, woe is me. The family in front of us finally walks away with their literal bags of food, and thankfully Paramore-girl and mop-head are only buying a bottle of water. I can see the light at the end of the tunnel, and I’m on my way to reaching the paradise of the theater seats. So it seemed, anyway, until one of the children to my right decides to start kicking and screaming for no reason.

This child is screaming its goddamn head off, and per my grumpy being I hang my head in annoyance. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” I mutter, “Would you mind shutting that kid up?”

Everyone’s staring, needless to say. The child’s mother is mortified and failing miserably at trying to quiet her daughter. No one wants to help, and the only thing the woman behind me can say is “Aww, poor kid.” Poor kid? Poor kid? You’re joking, right? I’m the one that has to suffer through this screaming. Poor me.

And then it happens. Christ himself descends from the sky and kneels down in front of the child, palms resting gently on her shoulders. He looks deeply into her eyes and says, “Be still, my child. All is right.” Jesus then reaches into his robes and pulls out a box of Buncha Crunch, offering the candy up to the child as a peace offering. The child, in awe of what just happened, takes the candy in utter glee and wraps her arms around her savior. “Thank you, Jesus! I love you!”

The son of God then spreads his arms, hands open and palms up, looks to the sky, and departs for Heaven. A warm glow surrounds the theater, and everyone begins to applaud. “Christ is risen!” shouts one woman, followed by another man shouting “Praise be to Him!”

…

Okay, so maybe Jesus didn’t actually descend from Heaven to hush the crying child, but a man did kneel down to her to make an attempt at quieting her.

The man, dressed in a blue t-shirt emblazoned with the image of Pac-Man, steps toward the child and rests his palms on her shoulders. The little girl is mortified. Her crying has ceased and now, I’m sure, she just wants to know why the fuck this weird old man is touching her. He leans in close and says, “You think you have it bad now?”

“You’ve got it easy kid. Save those tears for later. You haven’t had your heart broken yet, you don’t have student loans to take out, you aren’t dying, and you’re about to see a movie. Things could be worse.”

The girl, still staring at the man blankly, asks “How?”

So the guy sits down and crosses his legs and tells the girl flat out, “We all die someday. I’m going to die, you’re going to die…why cry over candy? Why waste the tears? Save them for what really matters. Save those tears for when you’re drowning in debt and you don’t know how you’re going to make rent.”

By now the girl is totally silent, and has her arm wrapped around her mother’s leg. The man stands up, and people actually start clapping. The woman behind me says to him, “If you’re not a teacher, you should be.” He nods, chuckles, and says thank you. He’s proud of himself, and apparently proud of his grim little diatribe.

I’m fucking mortified though. His discussion of reality now has me thinking about my eventual death and the fact that I, too, have student loans to pay back.

Another woman, who didn’t hear the man’s speech, asks “What did you tell her?”

He smiles, leans in — this dude has a hard-on for leaning, I swear it — and says, “I just told her about how awful life can be. She doesn’t understand concepts like death and debt right now, but one day she will and she’ll realize that crying over candy is so totally inane.” There’s intelligence in his reasoning, and I see his point. I still wonder why the hell he would say that to a child instead of something lighter. Maybe this guy had issues of his own, right?

This man is the hero today, and I feel like the villain. He helped and I just quietly complained. He was relatively selfless in his attempts to quell the little girl’s cries, and I just wanted to tell the girl to shut up. Good and evil, I think, light and dark. He may not be Jesus, and he may not even be a teacher…but maybe he should be.

Attraction

His back straightens when he sees her.

I’m sitting quietly at my table, enjoying what remains of my crassly expensive hot chocolate, when I hear the door open from behind me. As most might, I looked to see who might be walking in. It’s something most people in the store did, actually, so I can only imagine how she might have felt to walk into a store and suddenly be seen by at least twelve different souls.

She’s blonde, her hair falls down in waves just above her waist — a waist that is hugged by a black skirt, which itself falls over black tights. Black leather boots climb her calves, stopping just short of her knees. Her peacoat appears to be violet, but in this lighting — and in my illness — it could very well be a vibrant shade of blue. A bronze pin pierces her lapel; a sunflower, stem and all. Her skin is pale, though her makeup…well, her face is three shades darker than her hands. Her grey scarf just barely hides the point where the paint ends and flesh begins, though who am I to judge? I can barely tell mascara from, Christ, whatever else it is women use to cover blemishes.

She’s attractive nonetheless, and I’m not the only person to notice.

The man in front of her sees it too, and I wonder if his noticing her is more blatant than mine. A writer can take quick mental notes — images burn themselves into the mind, perfected quotes to remember for later description and possible exaggeration. My notes were taken in what seemed like an instant, his were…well, his were lasting. Perhaps he wanted to make sure she saw him. Perhaps he wanted to leave an impression.

His sweater, an eggshell cable-knit with overdone holiday patterns, would most definitely make sure of that.

It was a size too small, something I guessed from his incessant need to reach up and pull the collar away from his neck. The poor man must have been uncomfortable. Underneath his sweater he wore a gingham button-up, with the sleeves pulled back and up his forearms. Pressed khakis lined his legs, and brown suede wingtips encased his feet.

He noticed her. She walked in, bringing in a gust of cold air with her, and we all noticed her. Beforehand the place was silent as the grave, the only sounds being churned out by ghosts of steam from espresso and milk. Her entrance was a disruption to our warmth — our peace. But as the door closed, most patrons returned to their drinks.

The man was next in line, but his gaze lingered on her for more than a handful of seconds. His hands, per usual, reached up to tug the collar away from his neck, and he straightened his back. His chest went from recessed to barreled, and in an instant he went from everyday orderer of coffee to, well, a more muscular everyday orderer of coffee. When he was called up to place an order, he coughed into his hand to deepen his voice. Black coffee, venti, room.

While he waited, he stole quick, silent looks at the blonde in the little black dress. How could he not? She was, after all, attractive. I kept waiting to see if this would turn into one of those moments from a romantic comedy movie — would he ask her out? Would he make an awkward pass? Would he spill his coffee on her “accidentally”? Moreover, I wondered, did she even notice him?

Her time in line was spent staring at the menu. She made no glances at any of the other patrons, and the only time her eyes shifted from the menu was to pull up the digital card on her phone. Caramel macchiato.

The man received his coffee, sipped it, and added his fixings. Was he taking time so he could spend more time seeing her? Was he purposely dragging out his order for this one woman who, arguably, was one of a hundred? Virginia is ripe with beach blondes, surely he could find another with ease. What made this one special?

Thus is the mind of the writer, perhaps. Perhaps these details were created fictitiously. Maybe I saw things that simply weren’t there; exaggerations, perhaps, to construct a readable experience.

As her order came up, he made his way back to her. Apparently while fixing his coffee, he had prepared a note on a piece of paper. This note was then casually slipped next to her drink as she went to pick it up, and as he passed the woman, he gave off a sly, satisfied smirk. To him, it was success. He left the building a new man.

She, however, crumpled the slip into a ball and tossed it in the trash can. Where he had seen victory, she had seen laziness. Cowardice, perhaps, could he not simply speak to her? Was he so disillusioned with his own pride that he thought hooking this woman would be so easy as slipping her a note?

Impossible.

The Loiterer

Names have been changed to protect the identities of described persons.

By definition, I myself am a loiterer. I frequently hang out in a single location for a long amount of time, aimlessly browsing the internet and talking with baristas. It’s fun. But today, there was a particular loiterer that I thought deserved his own post.

Let’s call him Donald. No relation to Draper, nor does he bear any resemblance to that mad man, but for today let’s call this man Donald.

Donald comes in wearing a space-themed shirt, decked out in glitter and the color purple and — of all things — cats. Cats. It’s pushing the three-wolf-moon line. He’s wearing black shorts (they look like Adidas sportswear, but that’s one detail that went unnoticed), and white tennis shoes. Donald comes into Starbucks and asks for a venti iced coffee with a strange (strange) twist: He wants half-coffee, half-whipped cream. The thought of a venti sized cup half-full of whipped cream makes me almost nauseous, but I can let it go. I’ve heard worse orders, and I’ve seen worse things.

While Donald waits patiently, he talks to the baristas behind the counter. He asks them how they are, how life is going, and occasionally mumbles incoherently to himself. It’s worth noting, though only slightly, that Donald is — or appears to be — at least somewhat mentally handicapped. I can see it in his facial structure and I can hear it in the way he speaks, so he’s either super-drunk or kind of handicapped. There’s nothing wrong with that, obviously. The man is well enough to walk into Starbucks and order his own drinks and pay with his own money.

Donald’s drink comes out to him, and he retreats into one of the larger, comfier leather chairs. He sits quietly, at least until women walk by. When women walk by, he’s as talkative as that super drunk lightweight friend that we all have. He goes for blondes though, speaking only when someone blonde of any age and any build walks past him.

One exchange went as follows:

“Did you get that cup here?” he asked one woman.
“Excuse me?”
“That cup,” he starts, “Did you get it here?”
“Oh, no, I didn’t get it at this store — but I got it at a Starbucks, yes.”
“It’s really nice. You save money with it, right?”
“I don’t really know.”
“Does it hold hot drinks?”
“I think so,” she says, “I’m not sure.”
“I should get one. I like yours.”
“Hm,” she pauses, “Well have a nice day!”
“Thanks!”

He’s not so much bothersome as he is random. He’s random in his sayings, though not in who he chooses to talk to. Like I said, he prefers blondes.

I hear Donald start to slurp his drink. He’s really going at it, vacuuming through every ounce of cream and coffee he can get to. After he’s done, he walks back up to the bar and asks for more cream. At this point there isn’t even any coffee left, and he’s essentially asking for whipped cream to be mixed with ice water. My hand glides over my stomach, clenching it lightly.

When he sits back down, one barista calls out a pumpkin spice latte. “Pumpkin spice!” he shouts, “Pumpkin spice, Leslie’s [name changed] everything nice!”

The barista whose name he used looks confused, and asks him, “What’d you say?”

“Pumpkin spice, Leslie’s everything nice!”

She chuckles awkwardly, ha-ha. He carries on, “I should have gotten two pumps of Leslie,” he says, “Two shots of you!”

I can barely contain my laughter now. I’m sitting at the table to his left, and holding in my fit of awkward laughter is the hardest thing I’ve ever done. A woman waiting for her drink at the counter gives me a strange look, as if to ask what I’m laughing at. I’m hoping at least one of the baristas can see me, but I’m hopelessly lost in my fit.

The tide of laughter eventually recedes, but not until minutes after Donald returns to his seat. At one point he asks a man — blonde, admittedly — what he thinks of the Pittsburgh Steelers. He asks a few other women about their respective days, but most of them ignore him by pretending to be on their phones or simply ignoring him flat-out. I can’t help but feel bad for the guy, but I also can’t help but feel like he should mind his own business. People come into Starbucks, generally, to get their coffee and leave — not to stay and chat with strangers.

That’s my job.

A Hiatus Explained

The followers of this blog may or may not have noticed a brief hiatus from new people watching posts. If you fall into the category that didn’t notice, no worries — my feelings aren’t that hurt.

But I do feel as though the supporters of this here blog deserve an explanation for my time away. Fear not, I’ve been doing plenty of people watching in my time, but I’ve also been busy with other projects as well.

For one, I’m expanding The People Watcher. Soon (Soon? Soon-ish) I’ll be opening the doors to a new people watching realm, titled “The Starbucks Stalker”. A fair portion of my people watching is done on location at my local Starbucks, and I — along with a trusted peer of mine — think it’s high time observations made at Starbucks got their own home. I’m happy to oblige, and I’ve already opened up a Twitter account for it. Previous Starbucks-based posts will be transferred from this blog to The Starbucks Stalker when it opens up. So there’s that.

The other news is that I’ve taken on the duty of an Editorial Internship with Her Campus. I’ve been writing for them for about nine months now (I started as a campus contributor, moved to a national position, and now I’m an intern). As one of, like, a small handful of guys writing for the site, I keep a busy schedule writing relationship articles and the occasional news article. More to come from that area of life, for sure.

I was also recently hired at my local community center as, well, let’s call it a “glorified secretarial position”. I worked the same job at a different center last year, so it’s nice to land a job I know I’m good at. That’ll keep me busy while simultaneously paying me.

Needless to say, I haven’t had a lot of time to dedicate to The People Watcher. I’m going to keep making updates, though.

As always, thanks for reading. I’ve reached a few personal milestones with this blog and I expect to reach a few more by year’s end.

We All Need Jesus

Names have been changed to protect the identities of described persons.

“Excuse me, ladies,” he started, his hands shaking, “I was wondering if I could bother you for a minute.”

The women, sipping coffee from ceramic mugs, looked up at the man speaking to them, confused. He continued, “My name is Thomas, I was wondering if I could ask you for some change.”

I wasn’t listening to the women sitting across from me before this, but I had heard them discussing Africa and Christianity before Thomas approached them. One woman reached into her purse, searching for money to give the man. The other kindly told him, “I’m sorry, I don’t have any cash on me.”

“I just got out of jail.” he told them, and immediately the woman looking for cash to give them man froze. “Where are you from?” she asked.

“Louisville, ma’am.”
“Oh that’s nice, my husband is from there.”
“That’s very nice, ma’am, I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay. Where are you staying?”
“Nowhere right now, miss, I really am sorry to bother you.”

Thomas was an older man, probably my height, with salt colored hair. His eyes were tired, and he looked physically worn…just like a lot of homeless men in this area, of which there were plenty.

“What’s your name?” the woman asked.
“Thomas, ma’am, my name’s Thomas.”
“I’m Christina, Thomas, it’s nice to meet you.”

By this point, she had pulled at least ten dollars in ones out of her purse, and was now looking for something else.

“My husband,” she started, “is the pastor of a church around here.”
“That’s great, ma’am, where at?”
“Just down the street!” she exclaimed, finally pulling out what she was looking for.

Christina handed Thomas cash and a business card.

“If you go to that address, my husband can help you with food and maybe a place to stay for a little while.”
“What about a job, ma’am, can he help with that?”
“I’m sure he could — he knows a lot of people around here.”
“Bless you, miss, thank you so much.”
“We all need Jesus, right Thomas?”
“Yes ma’am, I’m sorry, thank you.”

With that, Thomas was on his way. Christina and her friend, Sarah, watched him walk away. I was preparing myself for Thomas to come to me next, but instead he walked away. “Do you really think he’s homeless?” asked Sarah. The two of them were on opposite sides of the spectrum, something I discovered after Thomas had left. Sarah was a cynic, someone who believed the problems of the homeless were both their own fault and their own responsibility — the fortunate should not have to aide them. Christina, though wary, believed helping others was her mission in life — something she discovered on her previous trip to Africa.

“I don’t know, but Ben’s trying to help people around here. That’s why we made those cards.”
“He smelled funky.”
“He did smell a little weird, so I don’t know if what he said was true.”
“So why did you give him money?”

Christina shrugged, “Just doing good, I guess.”

I Lived In Green Bay

“Do you like Clay Matthews?”

Thus was a phrase spoken by one man to another man’s young daughter. When she stopped to turn around, he asked again, “Do you like Clay Matthews? You’re wearing his shirt.” Clay Matthews is a linebacker for the Packers, and his name is plastered on the back of this girl’s jersey. Somehow the jersey doesn’t consume her entirely, and is only slightly larger than it should be — but she pairs it with pink jeans and white light-up tennis shoes. She’s maybe five years old, if that, and dirty blonde locks fall down to her shoulders.

The little girl nodded, but did not speak. She did not know this man — he was a stranger. A nice stranger, surely, but a stranger nonetheless. The man went on, “I lived in Green Bay! I love the Packers!”

The girl’s father, a tall guy with a buzzcut came up along with her grandmother, who was on the heavier side of the scale but appeared happier than anyone else in their family.

“Where did you live?” asks the grandma.
“I went to Rasmussen!”
“Oh that’s great! My brother went there!”

They discuss Green Bay weather for a minute, among other things, before the man turns back to the little girl and says, “Well I like your shirt…and your shoes are awesome!” Awesome. He says it so enthusiastically — with such gusto — like he’s really trying to make the girl talk or smile or something. Awesome. Your shoes are awesome, he says, and I’m sitting here wondering why I don’t have a pair of light up shoes.

Now the girl speaks. “Thank you!” she squeaks, before turning around and running into her father’s car. The man looks to the father now, “Hey, I know you, right? You’re Air Force?”

“Contractor, actually, but yeah pretty much.”
“We’ve met before!”
“Yeah I thought that was you! Good to see you again, man.”
“Yeah, yeah, same! I’ll see you around!”

With that, the Green Bay family departs almost as quickly as they arrived. In and out of the store in under five minutes — I’m almost certain that their exchange with the Green Bay stranger lasted longer than their time in the actual coffee shop.

The Reader

Unlike everyone else in the store, he’s sitting at the counter. Two binders, both red, spread out on either side of him, dozens of cluttered papers between them. He flips pages back and forth, eyeing over one sheet and returning to another. A ballpoint pen dances between his fingers. He’s in uniform, Air Force it appears, and he’s obviously studying for something. I can’t imagine he’d be looking over classified documents in a place as public as Starbucks, though from the amount of black on his papers he very well may be doing just that. 

The man is of some type of Asian descent, but he has no discernable foreign accent — if anything, he speaks with a heavy Brooklyn accent instead. I hear him probably three times while I’m there: Once to ask for his first cup of tea, once to ask for a Black Eye (dripped coffee with two shots of espresso, so it’s safe to say the man’ll be up for a few more hours), and a final time to say goodnight to the employees upon closing time. When the barista hands him his Black Eye, he pounds it back like a champion. The barista is impressed, something I gauge from the way her eyes open wide and her audible “Wow!”

His pen scribbles on several sheets of paper, sometimes dotting the same location while his eyes scan back and forth. His left knee bounces up and down like a sewing machine while he goes over this mass of information. Maybe he’s studying for a promotion, or maybe he’s just going over information that he’s taking home from work. 

He keeps to himself, sometimes moving papers away from other people if the store gets a little crowded. I can’t tell if that’s out of courtesy or out of privacy — perhaps it’s out of both. Perhaps it’s just one. My mind bounces; on one hand he could simply be studying for something, on the other hand…

On the other, he might be a super secret intelligence officer going over classified documents of a pending alien invasion. What if. That’s what I enjoy about people watching — it’s as much focusing on real details as it is about letting your mind wander. 

The Artist

He’s sitting maybe ten feet in front of me, eyes buried in his Moleskine sketchbook, hands inching up and down with graphite in hand. I walked past him on my way in, and he was sketching out a contorted looking figure — a skinless man, it appeared, muscular system twisted about in unimaginable ways.

His right ankle rests over his left knee, but his right foot remains restless with a steady, relentless bounce. To his left lies a tall paper cup, empty and kicked over by a breeze. At least eight people walk past him, each slowing to look down at his drawing as they pass. At least eight people are unnoticed, or at the very least ignored, by the man. A tune, one not recognizable to myself, faintly wanders from his iPhone.

Whenever he finishes, his foot stops shaking and he looks up. He takes in his surroundings — I imagine that the man hasn’t bothered to look up since the sun was last up, and it’s been at least two hours since it went down.

What’s he wearing? Black loafers, khaki pants, a white collared shirt and a grey casual vest. The “artiste” look I think he’s striving for is simultaneously pushed forward and held back by his black rim glasses and his cleanly shaven face. One cannot possibly be a starving artist with a clean face…doesn’t he know the rules?

Upon his noticing of the empty coffee cup, he binds his book and struts inside for a refill before returning to his seat. He puts away the graphite and replaces it with an ink pen and reopens his sketchbook. For a brief moment, he closes his eyes and rolls his shoulders back, and then starts his work again.

His phone rudely interrupts the man, ringing out with a generic iPhone tune which forces the artist to pack up and retreat back to his silver car. From my point I cannot hear him talking, but his drawing hand rubs into his forehead in a response to this stressor. The man lights a cigarette, well out of distance from Starbucks’ new “no smoking within 25 feet of stores” policy (something this guy failed to comply with), before stepping into his vehicle and driving off.

I think I’ll see the artist again.

“I just want to go through Central Park and watch folks passing by. Spend the whole day watching people. I miss that.”

Well, Mr. President, at least you can still kind of do that via drones or satellites or NSA wiretapping. You’re not ~totally out of luck, but I feel your pain. Sort of.

One of the things I wish I had had the time to do when I was in New York recently was go to Central Park. I’ve walked up one of its sides, I’ve seen the inside of it, but I’ve never actually been inside of it. I can’t begin to imagine what kind of people watching possibilities are in that place, and I can’t wait to sit there and take notes someday.

I’ve gotten a fair amount of support for this blog since it began. While most of my time is spent at Starbucks or in class or in my own home, I’ve been able to watch a lot of people and gather a lot of great details and post a lot of great posts. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, this is as much an education as it is a hobby for me.

It’s gotten to the point where I can’t just go somewhere without thinking of a post. Obviously not every thought manifests as a post, but it’s hard for me to not go somewhere and write out an imaginary piece. Most people people watch when it’s convenient for them, they do it when they have nothing else to do — when they’re sitting in an airport terminal or waiting for the train or, you know, wherever — but for me it has literally become second nature, and I love that. I love actually noticing the details in things instead of passing them by, and I can’t imagine what it must be like to be so immensely busy that I lose out on time to simply exist; to simply sit and gather my thoughts and observe everything around me, to take it all in, you know?

That’s the kind of position Obama’s in. He’s busy running a country (although his methods of doing so and how well he’s doing are debatable) and attempting to manage a congress that’s tearing itself apart at the seams (again, how he’s handling that is debatable). It’s a hard job, being POTUS, and it shows in his hair color and in the wrinkles on his face. The man doesn’t have a lot of time to simply exist as a human being anymore, and I don’t ever want that to happen to me.

 

Ruining The Game

“How many of you watch football?”

My Public Speaking professor starts class off with that question. How many of you watch football? She’s an older woman, short and kind of stout — not dissimilar from a teapot — with greying hair and a slight lisp. She’s nervous, something she openly admits to being, something I think is odd for a professor that’s been teaching for almost 45 years.

“How many of you watch football?” she asks again.

The whole class, all 26 of us, look around at one another. None of us want to say anything on the first day — come on, lady, this is the first day of classes…time to look over the syllabus and get dismissed early, not actually discuss things. We don’t know each other like that.

“Okay, who here likes the Redskins?”

Something in the class snaps — this question triggers a response for some reason, and the audience begins either cheering or groaning. Hands raise immediately, as if to say “I fucking LOVE the Redskins!” and are followed almost as quickly by a booing crowd and statements like “Dallas all day!”

They’re all wrong, though, clearly the only actually good team is New England. I know that, why don’t they?

The class erupts into laughter over the now heated debate over who’s better, Redskins or Cowboys, and why. One man shouts “They’re America’s team!” while another shouts something about Romo being gay, as if such a thing mattered. Under my breath I say that clearly — clearly — the Patriots are better than either team combined. The girl behind me gives off a loud “Mmmhm, damn right” and I go in for the fist bump. She reciprocates.

“And what do you all think of the new safety regulations in the NFL?” prods the professor.

Now we’re all silent. You could drop a pin and you’d probably be able to hear it. Everyone looks around again, unsure of what to say. From the left corner I hear an utterly ridiculous statement, “It’s stupid, man, it’s ruining the game!”

The comment causes everyone to look at him. He continues, “They’ve been playing rough for their whole lives and now they’re telling ’em to stop and it ain’t right.”

The speaker is a vastly overweight white male with a shaved head and ears pierced by faux-diamond studs. An illegible tattoo crawls up his neck. He’s wearing a white t-shirt that, even for someone his size, is far too large and has clearly not been washed in a long, long time, and cargo shorts that are met almost immediately by white tube socks. His forehead is perspiring.

“So you don’t like it?” the professor asks.
“Nah, I hate it.”
“What about little league? The little kids?”
“What about ’em?”
“Should they be protected?”
“Of course.”
“Then why shouldn’t pros be protected?”
“I said it — they been playin’ rough they whole lives, and now they want to change it? It’s ruining the game.”
“How so?” someone else asks.

The man can’t answer. He just shakes his head and gives off a dismissive “Y’all are just gangin’ up on me ’cause I spoke my mind.”

The professor laughs, “No, no, not at all. We’re just talking — we’re speaking about an important issue — that’s what this class is about; being open and being able to speak publicly in a level-headed manner.”

He hangs his head and begins doodling in his notebook, seemingly defeated. The subject shifts to the professor and how she’s owned an RV for some odd nine years and has only accrued about 1,100 miles on it. Minutes later, the man raises his hand.

“Yes?”
“Redskins still suck.”