I was following a suggestion to just write about whatever I noticed. The first thing I noticed at a coffee shop was that the woman ahead of me had a small rip on the back of her slacks right beside the pocket button. This is what the came out of my head and onto the page.
A Hole in Her Pants
She clearly has a hole in the back of her slacks! What to do? She can’t do anything about it here. It isn’t “compromising”, the pocket fabric is behind it. Do I say something? Do I say nothing?
A good question to guide my actions is, “What is the loving thing to do?” I guess the first action would be to stop staring. That would be loving. But then what? Tell her so she knows and can relegate these to the “work pants” pile? But what if these are her best pants? What if she doesn’t have a closet full of clothes to choose from? Would it embarrass her? Do I care? Obviously I care enough to have this prolonged internal dialogue!
Why do I care? I want to be helpful – ugh! I grew up with too much of that! I think she might miss the hole when she gets home – that is pretty insulting! She seems like a grown woman. She should be able to take care of her own clothes.
Why do I have this need to fix things? Especially things that are none of my business and relate to people I do not know and have no impact on the world at large! Deep thinking from a hole in someone’s pants!
This is way too much work before the coffee I am ordering! Whew! She just walked out the door. Need for decision gone. Maybe I’ll ponder my need to fix things over my latte.
Drat, there is a hole in the curtain.
Many years ago I walked into a bank to make a withdrawal. Unbenoced to me my gym shorts were split all the way down the rear,there were four woman tellers who saw the ripp!When l went to get my money l noticed they were all smileing.the one wating on me told me about the ripp .as embarrassing as I was I’m still glad she told me because l was on my way to a mall. Anyway it’s probably good to tell someone