There I am in the salon chair. My hair is processing, foils glinting like an alien in a 1950s sci-fi flick. The woman next to me — two feet away, tops — is clacking away on her iPhone. You know, the fake keyboard clicks that sound like a typewriter circa 1985? OK Boomer, I think, rolling my eyes at my reflection in the mirror. Whatever gets you through the day.

And to add insult to injury, as she’s typing on her imaginary Selectric, her phone rings. Clearly, a gentle vibration was far too subtle for this busy lady. On a scale of one to Ma Bell, we’re talking full-blast ring tone. Let’s just say it would’ve been enough to roust Don Draper out of a martini-soaked haze.

Next thing I know, she has her medical appointment on speakerphone. For the next 15 minutes, I’m sitting there like a potted plant while she’s narrated her bloodwork to the entire room. I’m not part of the conversation. I’m even acknowledged. It’s as if I don’t exist.

Why do I let these petty annoyances get under my skin? I was thinking about this a lot while I was flying home last week. When it comes to pet peeves in public spaces, you don’t get much more petty and public than an airport.

There’s the family who rather than walk on the moving sidewalk prefers to block its entire width. There’s the guy in front of me who reclines his seat into my lap on a 45-minute flight. Or the woman across the aisle removing her shoes right before opening a brown paper sack full of hard-boiled eggs. Or the kid behind me who won’t stop kicking my seat or propping his foot on my armrest.

These microagressions may be gold for the likes of Jerry Seinfeld or George Carlin. But to me, they feel less like humor and more like evidence of a world gone mad. One where even the slightest kindness is too hard to muster. Where the simplest social contracts are broken. Where boundaries don’t seem to exist.

That guy yelling on his AirPods? He’s not trying to be rude. He’s just unaware he’s not alone. Or worse, he is aware and doesn’t give a shit.

When I think about it now, I realize what annoys me most isn’t the random seat-bumping or loud talking or slow walking. It’s just that taken together, these small infractions in public spaces add up.

They can make us feel insignificant. Powerless. And in this time when actual public spaces are under threat — I’m looking at you, Sen. Mike Lee — maybe they tap into a deeper threat. The anxiety that everything we think we share is slowly being defunded, claimed or sold off to the highest bidder.

But here’s the thing: Whether it’s Parley’s Canyon or a square inch of armrest, every public space may be more important than we think.

And just when I thought I was running out of patience for humanity, something else happened.

Flying back east from SLC, My dog Riley and I were on our connecting flight from DTW to ROC. Packed into a window seat in the back of a tiny jet, I tucked Riley’s carrier under the seat in front of me. A lady came down the aisle. She looked pale and exhausted as she took the seat beside me.

Trying to be friendly, I looked over and asked, “How’s your day going?” She replied quietly that it was going OK. I heard her say, “We married my daughter this weekend.”

“Oh wow,” I said brightly. “That’s great! Congratulations!”

She looked at me sideways and slowly repeated. “We buried my daughter this weekend.”

I stopped short, horrified by my mistake. “I’m so sorry,” was all I could say.

We share these spaces with strangers every day. In hair salons and airports and aisle seats and waiting rooms. Sometimes, in the middle of all that anonymity, there’s a flicker of recognition. Something painfully real. Something unmistakenly human.

So yes, maybe the pettiest peeve still feels like a jailable offense. But what if we all took a moment to be a little softer, a little more present. Especially in shared spaces. Especially toward strangers. They may be shouldering a load much heavier than we know.

Related Stories