If I didn’t know any better, I would say people don’t like people. But I do know better, and I still think some people don’t like people. And now it’s so much easier than you think to go a full day without interacting with anyone. Now this doesn’t mean you are holed up in a room all day binging on Stranger Things, I mean you are out and about, doing whatever it is you need to do, but you won’t have to relate or mingle with…ugh…people.
So let’s take a look at a typical day for the guy or gal who just wants to be left alone in a world full of people.
We start our day getting breakfast at McDonald's. You might think you would have to actually talk to someone to place your order and right off you have to deal with another human being. Nope! Instead, just walk inside and place your order at a menu screen, pay for it and wait for your order to be completed. All you need to do is pick up your bag of food and depart. Success! We didn’t have to interact with a living thing.
Next is an old standby, getting a little cash, just in case. We don’t want to use it, that would entail handing it to someone and of course, we don’t want that. We hit the ATM and our transaction is handled without the need of a person meddling in our financial affairs.
We’re off to the grocery store. Let’s stay away from Wal-Mart, those pesky greeters might ruin our day and we don’t want that. We get what we need for the week — everything from toothpaste to donuts. The deli has what we need pre-packed, so we don’t have to take a number, stand in line or talk (God forbid) to the guy slicing cheese and turkey. We make our way to the checkout and scoff at the sheep standing in lines and head straight to self-service. That 20-item limit is for others and no one is there to scold us anyway. We are careful not to make a mistake or buy alcohol and we exit without any personal interactions.
Off to downtown to feed the ducks, or some other activity that certainly won’t include another of our species. We buy Metra tickets on our app and when the conductor walks by, all we need do is hold up our phone. He probably likes that too, he’s got to deal with people all day, poor guy. On the train we are sure to keep our Beats on and only look down at our phone. A clear social signal that says — “Please leave me alone.” We stay with that strategy as we exit the train and make our way, wherever. No one will bother a person looking at a phone, most of our kind are too self-absorbed to bother anyway.
Later that afternoon, we hit a snag. We walked a long way and our train is going to be at the station in less than a half-hour. And if we hail a cab…? Thankfully we have Uber to come to the rescue. We order a ride and use the new “Silent Mode” and our driver knows not to talk to us. We come dangerously close to an interaction when we are greeted by name as we get into the car, but all we need do is nod slightly and the rest of our ride is interaction-free.
Back on the train, our trusty Ventra app keeps the conductor at bay and our Beats keep the rest of the passengers from interrupting our non-interactive day.
Gassing up the car on the way home is another easy one — all we need is our credit card. As long as we are sure to have plenty of water with us, we don’t have to go inside. Even in the worst-case scenario, and our thirst is out of control, there’s always a vending machine to come to the rescue.
Home again, home again, jiggidy-jig. A full day outside and not a single instance of personal interaction. But that took a lot out of us. I think we need to take a break from the real world and binge watch Netflix and communicate with people the way God intended; texting and updates to social media.
