Well that's a long title.
What I'm talking about is when you do or say something in public and a stranger looks at you, or says something, that makes you feel like you are to be as ashamed of yourself as Yoko Ono. If you don't know what I'm talking about (and there is a good chance that I AM making no sense and you don't) I'll give you couple of examples.Today my Father, my Sister and myself went on a road trip to a small little town called Mt. Tambourine . There is a famous fudge store there that hand makes all of there fudge on premises, and has exciting and delish flavours (or so I have heard) such as apple pie, and turkish rose. It also sells a variety of other lollies and sweets. Anyway it was the first place we went to when we got out of the car. Full of beans and fuelled on the excitement of arriving I walked in and beamed as I saw that they now sell ice-cream and not just any ice cream, but CocoLuscious ice-cream This is this godly ice-cream that is based on coconut milk and is Vegan. It is my all time favourite ice-cream and I have a relationship with the mexican chocolate flavour that no one will ever understand (weird, yeah). Fellow vegans will understand the joy of stumbling across somewhere that caters for us.
I exclaimed my excitement to my sister and father and went on to raid the store of every dairy, egg and gelatine free sweet they had. Later we went on a short bush walk through the rain forest and on the way back my sister commented on how ridiculous the women next to me in the shop reacted to my exclamation about the ice-cream. I couldn't recall a women so I asked her what she meant, confused. Apparently in my excitement I had exclaimed something like "Holy Shit! They have CocoLuscious ice-cream!" And there was a middle aged women women who gave me a very, very disgusted look. I can assume that she didn't like my use of profanities. I immediately felt embarrassed. But the funny thing is, I didn't even realise I had sworn, nor did I notice the language police burn me with her eyes. But I still felt bad. I know I shouldn't. I was excited and there is nothing that will pull passion out of me like ice-cream. My sister explained it as a "knee jerk reaction" to my excitement and that that lady just needed to loosen up. My parents are very liberal and my dad said that he had thought about telling me off after seeing the lady's reaction but then remembered that he would never discipline his children to please another person.
This event reminded me of something that happened a year ago, at a cafe, again with my father. We were having coffee to celebrate me finishing all my assignments. At the table across from us was a three generations of germans, a baby girl, her mother and the baby's grandmother. This cute little blonde dimpled baby was the only one facing me, she must have been maybe 9 months old. As she happily sat in her highchair chewing on her bread crusts she stared at me and gave me a big grin. I smiled back at her. She had that power that babies have that draws you in, intoxicatingly cute. As I sat there smiling at her she started pointing at things around the room, showing me and amusing me. Her grandmother and mother remained oblivious to our exchanges, deep in conversation in German. The baby was bored, and the women at the table had better things to do then play with her. I poked my tongue out at her playfully and she poked out her little rasberrie pink tongue back. At this, her grandmother stopped her conversation with her daughter and looked at her granddaughter and looked at the person who she was looking at (me). I smiled at the sixty something year old women but she did not return it. She said to me "Don't. Don't do that." I looked at her blankly. She was referring to me poking my tongue out. "Because if you do that then she will do that and... no." I flushed red, confused and embarrassed. My hot-headed dad just said "You have got to be kidding me." and shook his head. "She's a baby, we were just playing with her" the lady just shook her head. My father then stood up and we left. He was furious at her. I was just analysing whether I was in the wrong or she was. I think that the worst part of the situation was the fact that the lady was telling off another persons kid (I was 15 at the time, still a kid by most definitions) and my dad did not like that at all. The daughter sat there with her head down ignoring the situation.
But now I understand that she was in the wrong. It was a power trip, and it was rude of HER to discipline me. But I just hate how bad she made me feel, I was even more insecure and unsure of myself a year ago then I was now and everything I thought was based on what others thought and their reactions. So it really hit me hard. (Always dramatic haha) I have OCD so I spent the next couple of months obsessing over this lying awake at night.
Anyway please comment your opinion on the situation. This has been my first post and I'm sorry if you found it boring but at the same time I'm trying to not please other people with these posts. Thank you for reading :)
