Hello and welcome! An introduction for you: I'm a mom, wife, friend, animal-lover, and lacrosse parent who also happens to write, edit and manage a publishing company for a living. So why not start a blog, I thought? And here ya go...

September 3, 2009

A Little Personal Space


Is personal space something you need to be taught? I thought a sense of others' personal space was one of those "you just know" types of things. Like you know you shouldn't pick your nose, you know you shouldn't insult your friends' kids, you know you shouldn't date a friends' ex, you know that So You Think You Can Dance is a better show than Dancing With the Stars, you know that Georgia Tech is a better school than UGA. You know...you just know these things.

But apparently not everyone does know the personal space rule. If you're one of them, let me clarify. If you're in public or around someone with whom you are not intimate, you should generally give them a good 3 foot radius. Don't stand any closer. You can come in and out of the circle if you have a legitimate reason to do so but if you're just loitering, being any closer to someone than this gets uncomfortable in a hurry. And if you're in, say, a store that typically necessitates a buggy/shopping cart, you also don't allow this cart into that radius.

Case in point: I'm standing in a checkout line at Target and it's gotten to be my turn. The cashier is scanning my few things and I feel something bump against my hip. I turn and the older lady behind me has her cart so close to my body, it finally came in contact with me. She is oblivious to this so I slide down a smidge and return my attention to the cashier. And it happens again. She moved her cart to fill the gap once again and a slight lean by me to reach the credit card swipe I was no longer in front of had me banging into her cart again. She does notice that and next thing I know, she has moved her cart (already empty of her items that have been placed on the belt) alongside of me so that she herself could encroach on my personal space. She sidled up until she was standing a half a foot away from me. I looked at her, stunned that she wasn't as uncomfortable being so close to me--a perfect stranger--as I was to be that close to her. In fact, I was stunned speechless, a rarity for me. Oh, I thought of lots of things to say. Like, "Are you hitting on me?" or "If you stand any closer, you can tell what I ate for lunch" or "I'm flattered but I prefer men" or "Shall we dance?"

In the end, I bit my tongue because my manners are ingrained enough that I know not to be rude to perfect strangers, even when they are out of line socially. I did, however, slide her my phone number and, with a wink, mouthed "Call me" as I walked away. Maybe she will.

1 comment:

  1. lol You are not even right! I totally agree with you. Our society has become a society of invaders.

    Honestly, sometimes I have to catch myself from interjecting myself in peoples convo's. Not that I want to be rude, but sometimes someone says something that is so OFF the mark that it screams inside of me to correct them.

    And though I do do it sometimes, I find more and more that I don't say anything and just go on with my day.

    I use to think that I had to be right on everything......then I found out it was right just to be content knowing that I was right and not having to prove it.

    Hope your Labor Day's been good.

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