#mc personal

I took my kids to McDonald’s on Thursday. Even as I write this, I feel like being apologetic: Oh we only went because it’s the end of summer, and we hadn’t eaten out in a while, and the kids had a busy morning, and we were all hungry and not in the mood for more pbj.

I’ll get back to the apologies and politeness curse later.

But wait.

I was raised that you are polite first while out in public. You know what I mean. If you meet someone in the aisle of the grocery store, you move first and say excuse me while you do it. You hold doors for people behind you. You let a car in if there’s lots of traffic.

I shouldn’t have been polite at McDonald’s.

My two kids are five and eight. Old enough to kinda do their own thing but young enough that they still need a constant eye. We ate at McDonald’s, and I noticed this man - large, tall - sitting facing me near where you order.

He was staring at me. I pretended not to notice, gave my kids my focus, but I was aware of it, the way you are aware of a bee hovering on the far side of the playground.

I packed up our tray with trash, told the kids it was time to go, and got up from my seat. Immediately, the man sprang up and rushed over.

He asked, “Here, can I help you with your tray?”

I was standing right beside the trash can, but politeness surged through me. It was an immediate response to say, “Sure. I appreciate it. Thank you.” And I let him take it.

He replied, “How could I not when you look like a model standing there?”

Look like a model.

And you know what my response was? It definitely wasn’t to tell him that was inappropriate and he should back the fuck up. Nope, that’s not what I did.

I looked down at myself, saw what I was wearing - jean shorts, red tank, my hair in a bun, nothing special - and my immediate thought was I’m definitely not a model. He’s just being polite.

He’s just being polite.

The reality is, I gave a little laugh, I said, “Definitely not, but thanks.”

Thanks!

And I proceeded to herd my children out toward the door.

The man went back to his seat by where you order. As I made my way to the door, he said something to me, but at this point, my ears were buzzing. All I could think was Get home safely.

I got to the door, and the man got up and was right behind me. At this point, I felt a surge of panic. My thoughts were spinning, bouncing around to “I need to get to my car” and “let me hold onto both my kids” and “should I just go back inside first?”

I hovered on the sidewalk. The man was followed out by a woman and another man (who had ordered food), and the three of them got into an SUV parked in a handicapped space.

Once I saw what they were doing, I hurried across the road to my own car, stuffed both kids in, and locked the doors. I tried to immediately push the incident out of my head, but I just couldn’t. I broke out in a sweat, I started to cry, and so I called my husband and told him what had happened.

But even after that, it took me a long time to feel okay again.

A large part of me understands that this was such a small event. Nothing really happened. The man - I guess - gave me a compliment and did something that could be considered nice. But you see how the politeness is coming out: he gave me a compliment. He was nice. I owed it to him to let him take my tray. He was helping me out.

But two days later, I can’t see it that way. I see it as a man who felt like he had the right to invade my personal space, to speak to me like that with my children right there, to take something from me that was not his, to put his opinion of my appearance on me as though he had a right to.

Even now, I also try to spin out the reality of what happened. Maybe he was mentally disabled is one of my options. He didn’t order anything. He was with two other adults who did. I have an uncle who was born mentally delayed, and his social skills are severely lacking. As a kid, my cousins and I found him kind of odd in a he’s different sort of way. His hugs were a little too hard, his touches held a little too long, his smile a little too big. But now that I’m an adult, and I understand him so well, I see that he’s just a very friendly guy who desperately wants to connect with people. I get that now because I have known him my whole life, because we’re close, because he’s familiar to me.

And maybe it was the same with this man. His smile was a little too much. His focus on me was off. Maybe he just did not understand that you do not approach a woman - especially one alone with her children - and make comments about her body.

Yet, here is where I debate with myself. And I wish that I had handled the situation differently. I wish I had just said, “No, thank you, I’ve got it.”

No, thanks.

I believe, as women, we have the right to tell people to go away when they are making us feel uncomfortable, when their attention isn’t wanted. And we can still do it in a polite way, in a way that allows us to maintain that steadfast friendliness.

I wish I had said, no, thanks.