Just this past week I was on a date with my wife. We went to a restaurant. While we were sitting at the table I had this realization that our society is built on socialization, with one caveat. People rarely practice this outside of their own group.
What do I mean by this? You may ask.
Well. Just think about it…
Our world requires people to socialize with other people for their jobs, relationships, and grocery shopping, and there are many other reasons to socialize as well. Well, actually, let me rescind grocery shopping. Thinking back to when I last got groceries, I was able to make it through an entire store without talking to anyone. I did this simply by looking up what I needed on the store app and using the self-checkout.
Let us go back to the date with my wife and me. We had finished eating our green papaya salad which, was delicious. At this point we were sharing fried rice and a catfish claypot. I couldn’t figure out what to order, so I went with my tried-and-true solution. I asked the waiter what the best dish was.
Ah, look at that, I asked the person who works at the restaurant about the menu instead of asking AI, Google, TikTok, Instagram, or any other online source.
Well, the waiter recommended the catfish claypot. I sometimes will trust someone blindly and in this case I did. I ordered it without asking for any details and did not bother reading the description on the menu.
And guess what, it was amazing. It turns out the person that works at the restaurant knew their best dish.
So as we were chowing down on these delicious dishes, I happened to notice a pattern with our waiter and restaurant-goers.
To paint the scene, there were people sitting at a table on either side of us. Each table was about two feet away. Which mind you, felt extremely close. All three tables took up probably no more than ten feet.
First, here is the weird thing. Even though the people at each table were socializing with one another, each group that was literally less than an arm lengths ignored the other group.
You may say that this is just how you are supposed to act in public. Though I would counter that and say, isn’t it fun to break the norm sometimes and be a little awkward? Sometimes I just want to comment on something to start up a conversation with a random stranger. And hey, I sometimes do.
The waiter was now coming around to each table on either side of us to take the orders. In the process he made the same joke with each group, something about ordering wine or other.
The whole thing got me thinking. People like to stay in their own bubbles. It’s what they know which can create a sense of comfort. But I say, isn’t that boring to do sometimes. Wouldn’t it be fun to reach out of that bubble to see how someone else thinks of something, or just how their day is?
Anyway those are my thoughts and I hope to see you on the next post, dear reader.
-Abe
