A Procrastinator’s Hobby

People watching... It is truly amazing what you can observe about a person as the sit and eat their lunch, or drink their coffee or just in how they carry themselves down the street. Are they anxious or sad? Do they like themselves or those with them? Are they shy or outgoing? Do they care about their appearance today or did they just throw something on?

But I have to admit that I most of the time I become so busy checking off “To Do List” tasks that I don’t truly take in the fullness of a people watching experience. Well, this was until the time for “serious” Greek study came to be the pressing thing on my calendar yesterday. If there is anything I’ve learned in Divinity School, it is that often studying can NOT be done at home. If I am at home and trying to read or write, there seems to be a million other things calling for my attention…. bills to be paid, laundry to do, dishes to put a way, just to name a few. This is especially the case if the studying task at hand is one that I don’t particularly enjoy. Of course, Greek made it into this category.

So, for the last two days, I have been taking myself on dates to local coffee shops and restaurants that encourage their patrons to sit and stay as long as they would like to. And, instead of finding distraction-less places to study, my thoughts have been consumed in people watching. Have you ever thought about how interesting the human race really is?

For example, last night at a local bookstore coffee shop, I observed the following:

A high school student being tutored by a SAT coach

An English woman in her mid-70s sipping tea and talking about the Cold War with young woman who was seemingly a history professor at a local college

Countless individuals with their heads in a book, seemingly having no idea that anyone else was in the room

A middle-aged mother and her middle-school aged daughter reading books side by side, talking between chomping on bits of a chocolate chip cookie.

A couple talking together, obviously on their first date, based on their body positions and the awkward factual expressions on both of their faces (I don’t think they’ll be going out again).

An older man speaking loudly on his cell phone in a language I didn’t recognize (why do some people not understand what “quiet please” signs mean?)

And, a father with two teenaged children, seemingly straight of the soccer field obtaining research materials for a school project. . .

The diversity of individuals I saw last night reminded me once again that I live in a world full of dramas that I could even imagine. As we all work to relate to one another, life truly is complicated.

I began thinking as a result about what a “coffee shop” culture America has become. Even if we are not coffee drinkers, the 20-30 somethings generation's favorite hang out place often centers on coffee. We go to coffee to read books alone. We go to coffee to meet new friends or catch up with old ones. We agree to “coffee” dates with people because somehow it seems less sketchy than meeting someone at a bar anymore. Coffee seems to find a way to slow many of us down from our crazy lives. Giving us the just the minutes to sit and exist either with another person or our own thoughts . . . what a rare gift!

So, even though I was quite distracted from studying last night, I am glad that coffee had the ability to broaden my horizon. I saw once again glimpses of the lives of such interesting people and stories that I would not have noticed otherwise.

In the end of my divinity school story, I just have to make a high enough grade to pass Greek and be done with this school thing finally. People watching probably was a better use of my time anyway... Remind me. I've always got some of this to do.