Do you people watch?

It is perhaps one of my most favorite things to do. ever. It doesn’t matter where: restaurants, airports, the mall. It literally does not matter. Not only do I people watch, but I’m also always trying to figure people’s stories out. When I’m around a person or group of people for more than 30 seconds I create the most elaborate stories in my mind about who they are, what they are doing, etc. I’m always trying to figure out who is related to who? Is someone a wife, girlfriend or mistress? What is this person’s job? Do they even have a job?

For example:

We were on an airplane the other day and a group of 4 individuals (2 50ish adults and 2 teenagers  boarded the plane and then began to try to get everyone to switch seats with them so they could sit together. Now that they caused enough of a scene for me to put down #GIRLBOSS (great book, read it) I was intrigued. It looked like the 2 teenagers were bf and gf because they hugged and said “great seeing you, blah blah blah) but then once everyone sat down, the mom came back up to the flight attendant asking one more time if they could all switch seats. The flight attendant made some remark about trying to get the bf and gf to sit together and the mom quickly said “oh no, no no” then she said something in a whisper that I couldn’t hear. Even more intrigued. The girl teenager was seated right in front of me about halfway through the flight, the mom came up and talked to the girl for about 20 minutes. As they were in an exit aisle I couldn’t really hear their convo but did manage to get out that the girl was traveling back to Canada and the other 3 to New Zealand. I concluded that this mom and dad were setting up for an arranged married of their son and this girl and had wined and dined her in the Caribbean (where we were flying from) to seal the deal. Of course, it could have been a family friend or a variety of other things than an arrange marriage, but hey.

Another example:

I was out to dinner the other night with my husband and there was a table of 4 adults and 2 children. The adults consisted of a (clearly) husband and wife duo who were Asian and two Caucasian men. The children, 2 and an infant appeared to be the husband and wife’s children. The baby was held most of the dinner by either of the two gentlemen and I didn’t see the husband or wife hold the baby for more than the few minutes while the wife breastfed the baby. I sat most of our dinner trying to figure out this dynamic. My scenario: The husband and wife were surrogates to the other 2 guys who were also married. This was some sort of “thank you for carrying our baby for us” dinner. Of course the more probable scenario was that they were just family friends, but my mind likes to wander.

It doesn’t matter who you are or what you’re doing. If I sink my brain into you and whoever you are with, I will come up with some outlandish story about what you’re doing. I’m always tempted to walk up to some of these people and say “Hey, I’ve been watching you and I think ____________.” I don’t necessarily think this will go over the best on some of my more outlandish stories, but one day I might just ask someone. Stay tuned for that story. I’m always asking my husband if he does the same thing in his mind. He never does and, quite frankly, he looks at me kinda crazy when I tell him some of the stories I’ve come up with. I still don’t think it is weird that I do it. He is the weird one.

xoxo,
Rachel