Friday, February 01, 2013

Table conversation

One of the many benefits of the "Me, me, me, I'm the center of my own personal universe and the star of a whole network worth of reality shows" culture we live in is that sometimes the things that people overshare are kind of funny. Okay, that's one of a very few benefits. All right, it's the only thing even remotely resembling the slightest semblance of anything beneficial. But still, this conversation, regarding a family's elderly relative holding rehearsals for his impending funeral to see (I guess) how they would conduct themselves, happened in a booth right behind me the other night when I was eating dinner at Sweet Tomatoes...

LOUD WOMAN: "You could have at least tried to take it seriously."
LOUD MAN: "How? He was sitting right there, looking at me. I swear to God, if they have him propped up in a chair staring at me during the real thing, I'm going to react exactly the same way."
LOUD WOMAN: "Was he supposed to lay down right there in the middle of the lobby?"
LOUD MAN: "Yeah, why was it in the lobby anyway? Even if the funeral is held at a La Quinta, shouldn't somebody book a banquet room or something? I don't think some family from Ohio needs to listen to a eulogy while perusing brochures from Dinosaur World."
LOUD WOMAN: "He stayed in that hotel last night and had already checked out."
LOUD MAN: "If he'd already checked out..."
LOUD WOMAN: "Stop right there!"
LOUD MAN: "All I know is I have never heard of anybody having a funeral rehearsal, and certainly not traveling around the country for a whole bunch of 'em. How many of these is he doing anyway?"
LOUD WOMAN: "We have family all over."
LOUD MAN: "The Rolling Stones aren't visiting as many cities as he is."
LOUD WOMAN: "All right, that's enough. Your behavior is unbelievable."
LOUD MAN: "I just think it's weird. You don't? Tell me it isn't weird."
LOUD WOMAN: "You're disrespectful. You owe him an apology."
LOUD MAN: "I'm not apologizing. He can haunt me."
LOUD WOMAN: "You know, he said we were by far the worst. And he saw Paula and Todd yesterday!"
LOUD MAN: "So?"
LOUD WOMAN: "Oh Mike, they live in Bradenton for God's sake! We probably won't even be invited to the funeral now."
LOUD MAN: "Ha! Try and stop me from going!"
LOUD WOMAN: "Oh, so having to do this today was weird for you but you're looking forward to the actual funeral? That's sick."
LOUD MAN: "What's sick is wanting to see how sad someone can be when you're pretending to be dead. Maybe not as sick as having to pretend that you're happy they're still alive, but what's really sick is pulling the kids out of school for the day to participate in this madness."
LOUD WOMAN: "The kids are fine. They've handled it a lot more maturely than you."
LOUD MAN: "You say that now but I guarantee at least one of them gets a fucked-up haircut and develops an unhealthy obsession with Tim Burton movies."



1 comment:

Number Whisperer said...

Does it count as oversharing when it's about someone else? In my book, that's considered paying it forward, in the form of a good dinner conversation.