The past week, I have spent approximately nine hours in the Nashville airport (I don’t recommend it to anyone) and have had more than my share of people watching opportunities. One of my favorite games is to sit there and play “Who’s the Spy?” There has to be at least one international spy in every airport y’know, and I saw him last Thursday at BNA. Medium height, stocky, swarthy, black hair with enough oil in the back comb to fuel my CRV for a month. He was wearing a very expensive black silk suit, white shirt with cuff links, black tie, and top dollar shoes. He spent well over an hour walking here, walking there, always looking around him, and never making eye contact with anyone that I could tell. Unlike everyone around him, he never touched a cell phone. That was a dead give-away, because we all know that calls can be monitored. Was he there to make a hit? Meet a La Cosa Nostra member from the old country? I pretended to read my Kindle and kept track of him from behind my Foster Grants. After over an hour of discreet observation, I was quite disappointed to see him standing at the bottom of the escalator with a sign……he was merely a chauffeur waiting on a late arrival. The spy was probably the granny sitting next to me.
I adore the reunions between grandparents and grandchildren. I really love it when the little guy spies the much loved grandparents and squeals their names as they go racing across the floor to be scooped up. Gramma, Grampa, Nana, Boppa, whatever…..it makes me choke up, missing my own, all of whom have been gone many years.
On a random note, the Nashville airport has more guitar-toting people and more tattoos than I have ever seen in my entire life. It also has the market on tall men with toothpick legs – and they all wore jeans so tight I could tell their religion.
Another observation is that people in shoes pretty much all walk the same way, but put a pair of flip-flops on the same feet and things change. First off, why do so many wear open toe shoes/flip-flops/sandals with their toes hanging over the front of the footwear? Here’s a hint….buy a size that fits the entire foot! It doesn't cost a penny more. As far as styles of walking, first off are the flat-foot flip-flop wearers who raise the knees in order to walk and land the foot flat on the ground without the usual heel to toe rolling motion. They remind me of a horse in a dressage competition, and I want to shout out tips to improve their style.
There are those afraid of losing the flip-flop. They are the ones who have their toes clenched tightly to the keep the center thong under control. They make me want to watch them walk away to see if the butt is clenched as tightly. Loosen up! Wear some sandals with straps and stay away from watching prison movies or “Deliverance.”
The oddest flip-flop foot walk I saw belonged to a woman who when lifting her foot to step, also lifted her toes away from the flip-flop, curling them upwards as if they were trying to touch her ankle. As soon her heel hit the floor, the toes curled completely up, only to come in contact with the shoe when the toe area had to push up off the ground. That walk fascinated me. I practiced it in the privacy of my hotel room, but never even came close to mastering it. It will probably haunt me the rest of my days.
After that, I'll probably just keep my toes under wraps while in public.
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