thoughtjunkie

Hiya. This is my first Daily People Watching entry. The concept is pretty simple, really. I sit in public for an hour every day, and I write down things I see. I do not listen to what they say; I don't care what they're saying. Similarly, I won't people-watch someone I know, nor will I post precisely where or at what time I was watching. If I find out any personal information about someone I'm watching beyond what I can see (i.e. overhear a name) I'm not going to post that either.
The point of this project is not to invade people's privacy, but rather to write about observations rather than ideas. To write without editing, and to write every day, and to try to find the beauty (or at least uniqueness) in everything everyone does.

Beard is red, pale green T. He talks with his hands, pounds them together, slaps them, cuts the air as he talks. When he swings his arms from the shoulder, his wrists and hands approach and hit each other like a wavebreak. He talks to a man behind a tree, wearing formless gray hoodie and formless black and white shorts. And when they leave, they disperse heads down and quickly, like spies with clandestine work to do.

Barefoot man tossing an undersized soccer ball in the air with his feet. He tips it to his son who's almost as good-- tip, tap, toe-to-air missile. The man's daughter, four at most, gets the ball and runs onto the playground, hugging it to her chest and beaming. When the dad kicks the ball it's controlled; three inch high bursts, till his ankle gets tired or the ball gets too much torque, and he passes it off to his son. His son kicks and knees the ball up above his head. He loses it more, but chases it better. Sometimes, he kicks the ball into the bushes and runs to pick it out of the leaves and twigs and flowers.

The lady's dress is black and she walks with conviction. Horizontal ribbing on the skirt portion, dark lipstick, legs shaved and stockinged, hair up, and high-heeled. She walks with impatient conviction.

Young-to-old, nicely dressed crowd. Women in dresses with colors according to their age-- the youngest in vibrant beetle-eye blue and green, or red-and-white flower prints; the oldet in an all tan dress complete with all tan stockings and an all tan shawl.

A grandma, red-auburn dyejob on her rhort permed hair, holds the scruff of a toddler's shirt. She walks him in circles round the jungle gym's chain ladder that he seems hell-bent on holding onto. His forehead hits his hairline about 4 inches too late, and his fat eyes ignore his grandma, because the rubber-coated chain he's got is just so damn interesting.

There's little boy testing his footing, atop a spiral slide. As he straddles the gentle pike of the roof, his Reebok's tap at the green plastic, until he decides he can't get purchase and slides off, onto the gym proper.

I'm sitting across from a man who looks like he'd be a natural at transvestitism. Thin face, sunshine smile perfectly proportioned to his peak of a nose. I think it's his eyes-- the lashes are long and full, and thick enough on the bottom so they look like natural eyeliner. His eyebrows too, flow to the bridge of his nose in shapely curves. Or then maybe it's his hair, that swoops over his ears, all salt and pepper and expensive shampoo. Step 1: Wax face. Step 2: Don heels. Step 3: Look fabulous.

Here's the dude that just walked by: Shock of blond hair receeded at the front and exploded in the back, like someone yanked a hanful of scalp back over his skull and left it there. He wore a sharp-green tank top, similarly vibrant red shorts and a fanny pack that jolted on his crotch as he walked-- what a schizoid color pallate!

A little girl climbs the chain-ladder, long brown hair in waves down her back. When her feet slip, the tangerine flower of a sundress billows at the ground like fire, and when her arms catch her full body weight, the hem of her dress flicks. She hangs there, dangling like an upside-down candleflame.

Young guy walks by, dark but pasty, brown eyes, hair long and swept back. Which is fine, except it's maybe half the thickness it needs to be; his skull shines through the whisps. He's gaunt-thin, and walks with his head bobbing forward. He's also the first person to look at me all hour. When he looks, it's wide-eyed and with the flesh round his sockets betraying fear. It's a vague fear, and not a nervous one. It's there before his head turns and it stays after he looks away-- grinding tension from something constant; not the sharp uncertainty of making eye contact with a strange man sitting at a computer. And then, when the gears click and he realizes I'm looking back at him, his head flicks away, back to his walking, and he turns into the shop.

The employee with blue hair scrubs tables down. Her hair's pilled into a loop of a pony tail, with long side-framing bangs round her face. She lopes with huge hoop earrings and glasses pushed to the top of her head. She sees some garbage on the floor and bends to pick it up, resting her wrist on a table. As she bends down, her off-hand curls delicately in a subconscious flex.

A man (my dear compatriot!) sits in a black leather coat and stares at nothing. He's got a G3 pen and a tiny pad, and scribbled lines of poetry that he mulls over before scratching out. His beard is curled and untrimmed, and he's pulled his hair back underneath a navy and red Nike hat. His leg bobbles up and down. He squints at the words in his head; he jots; he scribbles.