On Being Stared At

I stand slowly and move toward the wall. Hoping, willing, that the direction I'm facing is east. Praying prematurely that G-d will make me invisible.

Three steps backwards. Tight, furtive steps, and then I move forward. Three steps. Focus...

But they're looking at me. I can feel it as I stand, as I bow incrementally, as I strike my chest so softly. Their eyes are like spotlights, like dull lumps in an old mattress. Innocuous, but unrelenting; I squirm, but I cannot escape them. I'm from New York; I'm not used to such scrutiny!

I tried to find a quiet place, a subtle cranny where I could pray in privacy. I looked, and looked, but such a place does not seem to exist in Disneyworld. This small pavilion was the best available, and it would suffice, if not for the family behind me. They sit, and eat their ice cream, and gaze in fascinated bewilderment at this vision in front of them.

If you want to know, ASK!!

So I pray. What else can I do? They are still on my mind, but I push them to the rim; for the moment, I've stopped them from swimming in my thoughts.

Three steps backward. I ask for peace as I bow again. Forward now...

At the end, I smile at my mother, sitting at a table with my sister. "Ready to go?" she asks. She knows- I nod, and we leave.

But on our way out, I hesitate, and direct closed smile to my silent peanut gallery. Why? Why not? I can't approach them, walk up and demand an explanation for their careful, ignorant study. At least I can show them... something. Prove I know they were staring, that... that I'm a person, too.

So I spread on my grimace-hybrid, and the father grins back at me, an arc of something that looks rather like sympathy.

He thinks I'm crazy.

I am frozen.

There's nothing you can do. Be dignified.

And so I walk away, with the sounds of the park and my pulse thundering in my ears. Shocked, but oddly gratified. The reality of my good fortune crystallized again for me, for a moment. The goodness I am given; the greatness of my difference.

But find a better place tomorrow, please.