Reminded me of Beetlejuice

It's a common thing I do all the time - sit back and people watch. No matter if I am at the mall, the doctor's office or in a public place like at a baseball game or at a concert, it's just part of my 'norm' to sit back and observe human conversation and actions. I'm not trying to be rude or anything and I don't stare. I just casually observe. Many times it's the watching that gives me good stories, laughs later in the car and even, material for my blog.

My latest escapade takes me into a local medical lab on a Friday morning with my daughter to get some blood work done for her cheer physical. When we arrived at 9:30am, I was hoping perhaps we were there on a day and at a time when we would miss having to wait behind a million others just for her vein to spit a little blood into a vile and for her to piss in a cup. After all, how long can that really take, right?

To my horror, the waiting room was absolutely packed with people and there was not a chair available to sit in. After a few minutes of walking around outside, two chairs next to each other opened up and we proceeded to sit down. Little did I know that the people around me would lead me to feel many emotions in my time observing - laughter, sadness, wonder and frustration to say the least.

Well we ended up being in there for an hour and half and in that time, I watched. I watched because what else is there to do in an hour and a half in a waiting room with other people in chairs surrounding me. At a certain point in time, I realized that this particular day reminded me of an episode of the Twilight Zone.

The more I thought about it, the more I realized a better description would have been that it reminded me of the waiting room scene from the movie Beetlejuice. You remember, that strange cast of characters? The lady he was feeling up that was cut in half and slapped him? The native Shaman sitting on the couch with the shrunken head dude? And how can you forget Miss Argentina, the red headed hotty waiting to guide you towards your final destination? Yeppers. A strange cast in deed, all right there in front of me in that waiting room.

Allie was actually the first to notice it. She pointed out to me (whispering in my ear) that the kid in front of her was wearing handcuffs and shackles. And yes he was. Justin Bieber himself sporting his shiny bracelets and his 300lb big black bodyguard escorting him (or in this case, his parole officer). I swear this kid looked like he could not even grow hair on his face yet and looked too clean to have even done something so terrible as to be in such a situation. And he had the Bieber haircut which made it even weirder.

Then there was the old man with one leg. I'm not talking about one leg and a stump, I am talking about one leg and no stump, cut off all the way at the hip. That poor guy had those short crutches and could barely get in and out of his chair. This made me wonder why he was not at least in a cheap wheelchair or something. How come he was having to suffer getting in and out of chairs like this, with no aide to help him nor a relative or nurse to escort him. This was simply sad.

There was also a big 330lb man (he made sure to tell me this) and his wife sitting next to us. He attempted to talk my ear off, grey tooth in the front and all. This man mumbled like he was drunk and I could barely understand most of what he was saying to me and at times, none of it. He was probably the only reason I had a small laugh internally while we were there. I had to snicker when he was at the counter as his shirt proudly exclaimed "By the time you are done reading this I will have farted". Ah the joy of those terrible t-shirts. Gotta love em.

There were also only about 20 chairs in the waiting room for people to sit. At one point, Allie stepped outside to answer her phone as there were no cell phones or camera's allowed in the office, to my dismay or you would have had candid photos of my observations, secretly taken of course. I know, that's rude of me. But I like photographing things that interest and entertain me and obviously these people did just that or I would not be writing about them here now.

Any way, Allie's leaving for a moment seemed to signal to some Mexican lady that it was okay for one of her 3 kids to swoop in and steal Allie's chair. And so she told them to grab it. I promptly let her know the seat was taken and that it was my daughters, which she told them in turn so that they could move when Allie returned. I suggested that they actually take up another seat across from her on the other side that had just opened up, trying to be at least a little helpful to her. But the truth is that there were two Mexican women there with 3 kids each and when I sat back and thought about it, it sort of made me mad. Really? You have to come down here for yourself or perhaps one of the children but you have to drag them all along with you? And out of allll the family members you must have being Mexican and all, you can not have some one watch the rest of them for a few hours while you take care of business? These two would rather take up 8 of the 20 measly chairs then to be courteous and leave the majority of the burrito at home. It blows me away. Who the heck would want to drag 3 or 4 kids along with them anyway if they did not have too, especially to a doctors office?

Lastly, a young white lady came in with 3 other ladies and took up another 4 chairs that had just opened up. In over hearing their conversations, I take it she was some kind of bus driver driving them around to their appointments as she mentioned dropping one of them off at the YMCA. I sort of thought the same thing about this arrangement - you can't just drop the one off having tests run and then come back for her? You gotta come in and take up 4 chairs for an hour plus? Why could she have not dropped them off at the Y before coming to the appointment?

Any way, these ladies proceeded to gibber about lots of stuff and ended up talking about making beaded necklaces and things as a hobby. One of them mentioned that one of the other ones had just made her bracelet and anklet that she was wearing and she proceeded to show it off. Someone suggested that they all do it together and one even asked if the others were interested in learning. Then the 3rd Indian lady spoke up (there may have been something wrong with her, but it did not seem so) and as if she was willing to share, said "I have beads and string in my room". That would have been fine, but then it started to sound like a broken record "I have string in my room. I have string in my room. I have string in my room." By this time  it was going on the hour and a half of me sitting here and I had no patience left. I just wished some one would acknowledge her so that she would shut the fuck up already.  I wanted to take the damn string in her room and strangle her with it.

By this time, I had just about had it, so I told Allie I was going to step out and smoke a cig for a minute. Thank goodness, when I returned, Allie was gone and I only had to wait a few minutes for her to get out and for us to be able to leave. All I know is this - I left this place wondering what the hell had just happened. I had never been in such a weird environment at a doctor's office or lab before and this was just an overall weird experience for me, one that I care never, ever to repeat.

I know there will be many more days ahead of me where I will people watch but I hope to never again have the weirdness of that day.  Give me the people of Wal-Mart any day, at least I could take photos of that. But please, keep the Beetlejuice characters in the movies and out of any place that I might frequent.

Until next time :)