People Pleaser

So today I did my observations a little bit differently. I’ve been so very short on any kind of extra time, so I did the only thing I could think of and broke my time up into two parts between my two classes. So I first went in at around 12:30 and stayed for about a half hour, then went in again a little after 2:30 and only ended up staying just shy of 20 minutes before sprinting to my English class.

Needless to say it was kind of an odd day as far as observations go, but what made it really odd was that both times I went in, two different people asked me to watch their things for them. The first was two girls who looked a little older than me. I was sitting in a booth against the wall and they were sitting at the table directly in front of me. They asked me if I was going to be there for a few minutes, and as I had about 15 minutes before I had to leave, I said yes. So they asked me to watch their things and promised they would be right back. Eight minutes later, I started to get a little worried that I’d have to leave their things unattended. It’s not that I thought their things would actually get stolen if I left them there, it’s more the principle of following through on a promise. So I kept waiting, and started to panic a little about two minutes before my expected takeoff time. Needless to say I didn’t get a lot of other observing done. Then literally as I’m gathering my things, feeling bad about leaving their things alone, they walk back in like they haven’t been gone for almost twenty minutes, thank me for watching their things, and go back to whatever they were doing before. I ran out of there like a crazy person, thinking to myself how that’s the last time I do that.

Two hours later I’m back in Corbett. I’ve been sitting for about a total of 36 seconds when some guy comes over and sits next to me. I was, again, at one of those long booths, so it’s not like he snuggled right up next to me or anything, but he said hello and took out his food to eat. About a minute later, he asks me if I’m going to be here a few minutes and if I can watch his things for him. The words, “Yeah of course,” were out of my mouth before I could even form a thought in my brain. But I told myself it will be fine, I have twenty minutes and I’m SURE he won’t take so long like those last girls did. Long story short he did. Right as I’m about to go into panic mode and start thinking up excuses to tell my English teacher why I was late, he comes back in. He thanked me of course, apologized for taking so long, and promptly launched into the story of how he was looking at a bike to buy. He was a foreign exchange student so I had a little trouble understanding when he was talking fast but it was kind of cool how we just ended up having a conversation about bikes. Before I realized I was going to be late of course, and had to run off.

Last year I went to community college in my home state of Oregon. I lived in Eugene for 7 years and it’s an awesome, uber-friendly little town. But the college was not. I hardly ever talked to anyone even in my own classes. So coming here and having people just come sit down and talk to me is really nice. Most days I go sit and make my observations, at least one person will say hello or ask me how I am. Sometimes they’ll ask if a seat at my table is taken and sit to eat their lunch or study and, more often than not, chit chat with me. It’s really refreshing to be in a place that is so friendly with people who aren’t afraid to come sit down  and talk with a stranger.