{"id":10960,"date":"2018-06-28T19:27:58","date_gmt":"2018-06-28T23:27:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/?p=10960"},"modified":"2018-06-28T19:27:58","modified_gmt":"2018-06-28T23:27:58","slug":"social-awkwardness-in-a-chinese-restaurant","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/?p=10960","title":{"rendered":"Social awkwardness in a Chinese restaurant"},"content":{"rendered":"

One aspect of being a strange person<\/strong> is having strange experiences. Experiences that are strange merely because it\u2019s you involved.<\/p>\n

A strange sort of coincidence happened to me yesterday evening. Only weird because I\u2019m weird.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m a man of routine. Part of my regular agenda is to go to the gym on Wednesday evenings, and then have Sweet & Sour Chicken at Lee Ann Chin\u2019s (a local Chinese chain) afterward. This I did last night.<\/p>\n

I was sitting at a table, eating and reading a book on my Kindle. The table was at the back wall, and I was sitting on a long bench that stretches along that wall and serves three different tables. At the time I was the only one using any of those tables.<\/p>\n

I was reading another Logan McRae novel \u2013 that series whose quality I admire, but which I just don\u2019t like much. But I bought this book by accident, and I wasn\u2019t about to dump it. <\/p>\n

This one is more difficult than most for me. It involves the kidnapping and trafficking of children. There are scenes of abductions, and scenes of children held prisoner, helpless and hoping for rescue that doesn\u2019t come.<\/p>\n

For reasons having to do with my personal history (which I won\u2019t go into here) I identify strongly with such scenes, and find them very hard to get through. The scene I was reading at the time involved an adult approaching an unattended little girl, and tricking her into accompanying her to her car. Made my stomach clench. Almost put me off my chicken and rice.<\/p>\n

At that moment I heard a high voice at my ear. A little boy \u2013 maybe three years old (I\u2019m not good at estimating) had climbed up on the bench beside me and was looking at my Kindle in fascination. \u201cWhat you looking at?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n

Now, as you may recall, I\u2019m not comfortable with children. Don\u2019t know how to talk to them. Don\u2019t know how to treat them. My rules for dealing with children are basically, \u201cDon\u2019t ask their names. Don\u2019t engage them in conversation or encourage further acquaintance. Look around for their parents and hope they\u2019re coming to remove them.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

It took a moment, but the kid\u2019s dad finally did come to collect him, laughing.<\/p>\n

Awkward. With the added effect of the scene I was reading, I felt like the police would be coming to arrest me any minute. \u201cI didn\u2019t even talk to him, officer! He talked to me!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy would any kid talk to a weird old guy like you?\u201d the officer would reply.<\/p>\n

For which I would have no response.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One aspect of being a strange person is having strange experiences. Experiences that are strange merely because it\u2019s you involved. A strange sort of coincidence happened to me yesterday evening. Only weird because I\u2019m weird. I\u2019m a man of routine. Part of my regular agenda is to go to the gym on Wednesday evenings, and … Continue reading Social awkwardness in a Chinese restaurant<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[487,2609],"class_list":["post-10960","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-children","tag-social-awkwardness"],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10960","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10960"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10960\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10960"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10960"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10960"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}