I was sitting at the bus stop waiting for the bus. I was the only person there and it wasn’t like I was laying down on the bench or anything. I was just sitting there minding my own buisness.
Two elderly women walked up to the bench but didn’t sit down. They stood at the opposite side of the bench from me.
A minute or so after they had gotten there, one of the women commented on how there are much less gentlemen in the world these days. I heard her say this, but I didn’t think much of it. Until she continued to talk about how men used to make room for elderly people on the bus bench.
I thought to myself that this was a rather strange example to use. Then I realized that she was talking about me. She kept talking to the women about it, she was speaking like she was talking to me, but she didn’t look at me once.
I would have had no problem at all with moving for them if they had asked. However they didn’t, they just assumed that I was some stuck-up teenager.
I’m only guessing, but I’d say that a bus bench is about five feet long. I’m not a large person, I take up about a foot and a half of that bench. I’d say that there was more then anough space for them.
This encounter made me feel like the two of them were making a rather large assumption about the attitude of youth. I’m 16 and I don’t go around calling people names or anything. I feel like they didn’t even give me a chance.
My mother didn’t raise me to be a rude person and I do my best not to be.
I would just like to say that elderly people, and people in general, really need to not be so quick to assume something. There is no harm in asking a question. We, the youth, aren’t all rude and disrespectful and it would be nice to be given a chance.
Jayme Campagna
Nelson
