I took my sight-seeing trip to the Avenues in Kennesaw, a shopping center near where I live. (Maybe you've heard of it, but probably not). I left my house around 5:30 PM, and still a great deal of light falls on everything. Finding parking is always a pain, but I ended up stopping near the Gamestop I usually park next to. As I get out of the car, I see what I expect, a whole bunch of cars crowding the parking lot. Big surprise for a shopping center, eh? Anyway, I go to the sidewalk, wearing my black Apt. 9 jacket and Ozzy Ozbourne shades, and begin to stroll. The first thing I see on my left is a man listening to his iPod touch, while texting to a friend on his phone. At least, I thought he was texting, however upon further inspection I notice that he is talking to a friend on speakerphone while browsing movie times on his 3G network. Just goes to show that we miss a great deal because we only perceive things on our own scale, I didn't even think that's what he might have been doing when I first looked at him, because I can't do that on my phone. It's foreign to me, and I didn't recognize it at first.
It takes me a few moments to process all this information, but I lose interest and start to feel creepy about staring at the man with his phone and move on. The next spectacle I walk past is 3 girls playing by a fountain. One sits on the ring around the fountain with a camera, and the other two pose on a bench. Didn't take me long to realize they were taking pictures. However I mistakenly walked in front of them while the picture was about to be snapped, and I see the girl with the camera drop it from her eyes in annoyance. I walk by innocently, but not before I see the distaste in the eyes of the other two. But, even if I can't see these minutiae, I still try to keep my eyes open. Usually I'm not interested in the glares of teenage girls, but since my mission was to go out and “see,” I had to glare back. All in the name of discovery, of course.
As I keep going, the amount of people decreases, and it becomes easier to notice the stores. I wonder why the amount of people is decreasing though? I look back out to the parking lot and see more and more cars driving away. But why? Then, I take off my shades and notice that the sky is beginning to darken. Laughing at myself for taking so long to notice, I realize it's all a matter of keeping my eyes open.
The last interesting event I pass by on my journey is a group of 3 middle school aged girls and a young boy. As I walk towards them, they keep glancing in my direction, and when I finally get come close the group scatters, leaving one timid girl still in my path. I reel in confusion, I don't understand what I see. In a shaky voice, the girl says “Hello” to me. Smiling, I say hello back, and continue on my way. Chuckling to myself, I realize her friends must have put her up to it. I hadn't realized until that moment that I must have looked a bit frightening with my hair, black jacket, and shades. It was like I had been my whole life a bell, and never knew it until that moment I was lifted and struck. It was then that I felt envious of one-celled animals, because the sense impressions of one-celled animals are not edited for the brain: “This is philosophically interesting in a rather mournful way, since it means that only the simplest animals perceive the universe as it is.” A guy can't wear the clothes he wants without scaring little kids these days. It's really a shame, because I'm a nice guy when you get to know me.
As I walk back to my car, I reflect on the happenings I've come across during this hour expedition, and smile. What an interesting place the world can be, if people would only stop to notice.
~Mark Fredricks
(Bold- Quotes by Dillard)
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