Friday Night

Friday Night
Do you ever go to a restaurant and eat alone on a Friday or Sat night?

I saw this kind of plump woman eating and drinking beer alone last Friday night. I found myself feeling sorry for her because I know I would not like being there alone when all the other loud people in the place were on dates or with big groups.....Should I have left my table and gone over to her and sat down?

X,
I do it all the time. I usually take a book to read. I have plenty of friends and family but I am single. Most of my friends have children. Most are involved with someone. Many of them live in other states.

Bottom line, if I waited until I had company to eat out, I wouldn't be going very often. Not only that, but it takes time and effort to prepare a meal. Sometimes I don't have the time or the energy for the effort, especially after a long work day.

I also very much enjoy good food and cooking. I want to try different restaurants and unusual food and almost none of my friends are on board with the Thai, Indian, Japanese, Vietnamese cuisines.

So, I eat out alone most of the time. I am almost never lonely when I eat. Lonely is a state of mind that we can put ourselves into, but it simply doesn't occur to me. Occasionally wish I had someone special, but not when I'm eating out. Many of the places I go, I'm a regular. The owner or waiters/waitresses know me and greet me with a big smile (I'm social and tip well for a good job). In several cases, they have become friends and enjoy a chance to sit down and take a break from the job. Whether it's a familiar place or not, I have a good book, a good meal, and some quiet time, usually after a long day of continual interactions with others and stress.

Should you have sat down with the woman? Hard to say. It might have been her only solitude after a hard week. On the other hand, she might have welcomed a chance to visit someone new. I think it depends on what you were doing and who you were with. Some here have implied that she was alone because she was heavy. That's ridiculous. She may have had boyfriends all of her life or a bad marriage out of the way. She clearly had plenty of confidence and was comfortable in her situation. People tend to project their own feelings onto others, and where insecurity and fear are concerned, this is where they are most likely to be wrong.

I'm not saying you were doing this, but many of the other answers definitely were projecting their own feelings into her. It's kind of you to wonder about this, and you might be right in that she was lonely. However, she chose to get out and have a good meal. If she wasn't comfortable with that, she wouldn't have done it. That doesn't mean she wouldn't have welcomed company but it does mean that she's probably fine either way.

-Kevin

Lily Allen - Friday Night