If one would place their jacket or their bag or their hot pink glittery clipboard at a table, I thought it would be fair to assume that signifies to the casual observer: This Table Is Occupied.
Well, maybe the average person doesn’t carry around a hot pink glittery clipboard, but I do. It’s pretty hard to miss. It’s really pink. And realllllly glittery.
What baffled me even more is that apparently, the seat stealers did see it and took it upon themselves to just launch it onto another table without any concern. But when asked why they would do that, the answer was even worse than the action!
I’m getting ahead of myself.
Let us begin with why I was carrying around the hot pink glittery clipboard and placing it on a table in the first place.
As many of you know, I love marrying couples. In addition to doing the morning radio show on Q102 and being a (for the most part) generally pleasant person to the outside public, I’m also an ordained officiant. I’ve married relatives of mine as well as perfect strangers. To write a sincere, personalized ceremony for a couple, I like to get to know them and incorporate all the cute little things that make their love story unique. So in order to do that, I often times will meet with them beforehand at a coffee shop or little café to hear all about the wedding ceremony of their dreams.
Now enters the hot pink clipboard. Glittering in all its glory.
Maybe it’s the perfectionist in me but when I do things, I like to do them well. I also like to get to meetings early and pick out a table for myself and the couple that allows for comfort. One that makes them feel able to talk freely. One that’s out of the way. One that’s removed from the hustle and bustle of the sometimes busy meeting location. I’m a little picky with my table of choice. Maybe that’s weird but like I said, I put a lot of thought into things. So I get there early.
That’s exactly what happened last night. The couple was meeting me after work so we decided on a build-your-own burrito/bowl type of establishment. I arrived early and I was glad I did because most of the vacant tables were quite messy. Smears of queso. Shreds of lettuce. Crumbs. It happens, right? They were probably really busy right before I arrived.
But I wasn’t about to force the future Mr. & Mrs. to sit in someone else’s gunk. I walked over to the soda fountain, dampened a stack of napkins, and grabbed another handful of dry ones. Then proceeded to wash and dry a nice table all by its lonesome in the back. It was perfect!
Now we're to that part where I’m wondering how it all went wrong….
After I was pleased with the level of cleanliness, I placed that very bright and very paper filled clipboard onto the now pristine table and laid my pen right on top. Had I worn a jacket, I would have draped it over a seat. It wasn’t cold enough for that and the restaurant wasn’t that busy. I assumed that level of “stuff” marked my territory. I took my purse to the counter and ordered a beverage and began walking back to the table.
I think I stopped dead in my tracks because I saw what appeared to be a mom and two maybe teenager-ish girls now sitting at the table- my table - with their burritos and chips and drinks spread all over. Chowin’ on down!
I thought for a second that I must be seeing things. They could not possibly have just spread out their food on top of my stuff, right? So probably with a really confused look on my face, I walked back to my table and asked, “Um… where did my clipboard go?”
Mom laughs, “Oh, was this your table? We thought that stuff was one of the workers so we just threw it over there.”
Then right back into the burrito she went!
I glanced over to the table where she indicated it was thrown and sure enough, there it was. Tossed in a smear of god knows what and nestled on a pile of crumbs.
Now that I’m removed from the situation, I can think of about a million things I woulda-shoulda-coulda said but I was, in fact, speechless. For me, that’s not normal. I just really couldn’t believe how rude someone could be!
I cleaned my second table of the evening and for the second time made a nice little nesting spot for myself and the couple, but all the while had a million things swirling in my mind. How would you not know that table was occupied? I was gone for literally 30 seconds at the counter getting a drink. I had spent 2 minutes cleaning and drying the table prior to my apparent ridiculously lengthy 30 second departure to pay for a drink.
But above anything else, why did that group think it was perfectly ok to just throw one of the employee’s stuff onto another table? Why are you touching anyone else’s stuff whether they work there or not? And because you thought they worked here, their stuff is no longer important?
Who does that?!?!?
Really, who does that?
After discussing it on our show, apparently a lot of people!
Don’t touch what’s not yours. I mean, even cats and dogs get the basic understanding of personal space. Then again, they mark their territory by peeing everywhere and I really don’t want it to have to come to public urination.
I feel like we humans can do a little better than that. A clipboard should suffice.