After Church

It was a little windy today, which might explain the abundance of people here.  It is a Sunday, and it is about noon.  Everybody seems like they are in a relatively good mood for once.  Maybe it is that post-church feeling that people get after church, when they are calm and at peace.  I assume they just came from church, as quite a bit were dressed fairly well.  There is a mixture of ages around here, the youngest looks like she is less than two, while the oldest looks like he is nearing a hundred.  The atmosphere is positive, and it makes me feel at peace.

There is a family to the right of me who has bowed their heads in thanksgiving for their meal in front of them.  There are four of them, a young couple, with a daughter, and a son.  The daughter is the little girl who looks like she is less than two.  She has bright red hair, and sparkling blue eyes that can be seen clear across the room.  She keeps trying to pick at her food as her father engages the family in prayer.  I see him look at her with the undeniable “parent look” as he says “No Susie,” and continues in prayer.  She tries it a few more times before he sternly says “that’s enough”  at which point her behavior ceases.  When prayer is finished, she loudly squeals “’MEN!” and digs in.  I look around the restaurant to see the reaction of the other patrons.  They just smiled a little at her impatience and loud enthusiasm.  She looks at her brother as he focuses on trying to eat without making a mess.  He looks about five or six, and looks almost identical to his sister.  The parents just smiled as their mom cleans them up.

There’s a woman who has taken a liking to eating by herself.  A man approaches and sits next to her.  Her face lit up upon seeing him.  I do not see any rings on their fingers, so I assume that they are just dating rather than married as I initially thought.  She is a very pretty woman.  Her hair is a light brown color styled in flawless loose curls.  She smiles the whole time as he speaks.  I cannot hear what they are talking about, but her body language makes it seem as if she is either pretending to be listening, or is genuinely interested in what he has to say.  She is leaned in closely to him, and eats fairly slowly.  She smiles or laughs at almost everything he says.  I notice she keeps glancing at her feet, and it confuses me as to why.  She is not wearing any heels, but flats instead.  He does not seem to notice her discomfort, but she keeps smiling through it.  When they finish, they leave together.  He tries to stay some distance away from her, while she tends to migrate toward him.  I watch him continue to move away from her as she moved closer until they were finally out of sight.

I see the old man dining with his family.  He can still do some things for himself, but his family seems to be cutting up some of his food for him.  By the look on his face, he is not very pleased with this.  He is using a walker to get around everywhere, and when he gets up to go to the restroom, three people had rush to his side.  He tried gently pushing them away, but he was not successful.  One woman, she had “salt and pepper” colored hair, and was short, had scolded him for wanting independence.  “Dad! You know what happened last time you did something by yourself!” was what she snarled at him.  He gently pushed her away again and kept walking using the support of his walker.  A male followed close behind.  He was a middle aged man, and was wearing grey slacks, a dark blue button up and a black tie.  The people that were eating with the old man seemed to be his kids.  It made me question whether he was really nearing one hundred, or had just aged quickly.  Based on what I could see on what ages the kids looked like, I am assuming the man had aged quickly.  It did not look as if the mother of the kids was there, so  I assumed he was either a widower, or she was in a home.  When the old man came back from the bathroom, he put his head in his hands and stayed like that for a while.  Eventually he had both wiped his eyes and did the sign of the cross.  Since he was praying at the table I assumed he was a man of faith, and was just tired of the way his kids were treating him.  It was very obvious that he did not appreciate the way they were expressing their concern.  Nonetheless, he kept quiet, but kept going.