It began in fits and starts, as the people who were obviously flash-mob veterans moved assuredly through the crowd, while the rest looked furtively around them to figure out what they were supposed to do.
Forty percent of the attendees, had they been asked, would have admitted they had only recently moved to town and didn’t know anyone else there that day. No one asked, so no one knew, but it’s true all the same.
Of that forty percent, more than half had found out about the event through a weekly email blast sent by a local organization known for hosting “fun, cheap events for the exciting and broke.”
Of that twenty percent, about two-thirds came with a roommate they had known for less than six months and found on Craigslist. Fourteen of those living situations would end with a broken lease and threats of small-claims court.
Three girls exchanged phone numbers after a half-hearted conversation about how hard it was to meet people in a new city. “I know,” one of them gushed in relief. “I feel like in college — I just finished college last year — I had a million friends and we all lived down the street from each other. I don’t know what happened. I don’t know where everybody went. Do you want to get some coffee after this? I haven’t had any coffee yet today.”
About one-third came alone. Half of that one-third came alone because they hadn’t asked anyone they knew to join them. The other half had created a Facebook event (“Come With Me To The Flash Mob”) and invited all of their coworkers they were Facebook friends with, all of whom RSVP’d “Maybe” and then never spoke about the flash mob again.
More than half of the attendees, had they been asked, would have said that their primary goals in attending the flash mob were to “have fun” and “make new friends.” Most of them, if pressed, would have had trouble defining what a flash mob actually is.
Three people were unable to find parking and never showed up. Two of the three turned around and went home. The other drove to a nearby Safeway and spent forty minutes wandering the aisles, then went home without buying anything and got back in bed.
A young man wearing a fedora, who until that day was genuinely unaware of how most people feel about fedoras, overheard someone telling a friend “…and that fucking fedora-wearing asshole like he’s fucking Indiana Jones instead of a hairy sack of unemployment, like it’s not already bad enough–” and felt his face go hot. He took his hat off, slowly, hoping no one noticed the timing, and tried to crumple it inconspicuously in his hand. The hat was sweaty. He had liked the way it looked when he bought it at Target, but of course it was only hateful and ridiculous now. What was it made of? Polyester? It wasn’t even a nice hat. Of course it was stupid. He shoved it in a garbage can as he tried to casually walk away from the crowd.
After it was over, at least two people quietly and intensely cried alone in their cars, without being sure exactly why.
One woman had not meant to attend the flash mob at all, and was only in the area on her lunch break, but saw a commotion over on the other end of the plaza and wandered over to see what was going on. She’d heard enough about flash mobs in the last few years to get a general sense of how things worked, and thought what the heck, then joined in. She’d been meaning to be more spontaneous lately, and it looked like fun. After a while, standing on the edge of several different conversations, she became acutely aware that she was at least fifteen years older than the rest of the participants.
Ten minutes before the crowd dispersed, as many as 16 people were still thinking maybe it would be different, today.
Tags: emails, fedoras, flash mobs, hope, loneliness, will you be my friend
I’ve never felt so much sympathy for a fedora-man, and likely never will again.
I know, that made me so unreasonably sad. Fedora Man!
this is the problem I have whenever somebody speaks enthusiastically about burning one of those hats
I’ll be honest, like half the reason I went to my first depression skills class yesterday was to maybe make some friends.
READ THE TAGS
DO YOU REALLY WANT TO BE FRIENDS, DON’T PLAY ME, BECAUSE IF YOU SAY YES YOU ARE IN THIS FOR LIFE.
YOU CAN’T GO BACK ON THAT MALLORY, IT’S SOME FOREVER-TYPE SHIT
{I think it’s about time for another Bay Area ‘PinUp/ToastUp…}
I agree!
If you don’t mind my asking, what is a depression skills class? Because that sounds like something I could use. Good luck making new friends in yours!
It’s a class offered by my local mental health services facility where you get together in a group with a doctor leading the class, and the doctor talks about mindfulness and depressive thought patterns, and basically how to develop skills for recognizing and managing depression symptoms so that you don’t fall into the same pattern of thoughts and behaviors. The one I just started attending is made up of seven sessions that start over every two months or so, and I actually started on the class #7, but the timing doesn’t really matter so much and you can come in whenever and repeat classes if you need/want to. There’s a copay for attending (for me, anyway, which I didn’t find out until I showed up last night), but there might be both pay and non-pay options where you live. Look into it! There are other classes in my area that are available, like anxiety classes and depression classes focused on women around my age, which I’m probably going to check out once I’m done with this one.
This is crushingly real. Crying quietly and intensely in my car is kind of my M.O. after social situations.
you know what, I was already feeling like enough of a failure for eating lunch out of a vending machine for the third day in a row, this is just too much. Can someone write me a note for “too bummed out to work” so I can go home early today?
I never thought I’d 1) get the feels from an article about flashmobs and 2) feel really bad for fedora-wearing guys. So, I guess today really is a little different then.
Two years ago, I wouldn’t even go to a party where I didn’t know anyone or meet people from the internet. I’ve done both now, so I guess a flash mob is the next logical step in my desperate quest for friends in this city. I’m good at crying quietly and intensely, too.
well then. if anyone needs me, I will be lying down on the floor of my office, staring silently at the ceiling for the rest of the day.
OH GOD I went to a Story League event last night hoping it would be different. I lurked awkwardly in the corner and drank my gin and tonic and didn’t talk to anyone because I was literally one of the only people there without a group. So this is really…real for me right now.
The stories were great, though! But ugh why is human interaction so hard.
welp.
Mallory, publishing this and following it with a post about women and depression is just MEAN.
Oh god, does anyone want a hug? I just…I just really feel like I need to give a bunch of people hugs right now. Even Fedora Dude. Maybe especially Fedora Dude. And then he and I can go shopping for a new hat.
*holds internet-arms out shyly*
<3
This was beautiful, touching, and depressing, all rolled into a ball of wonderful.
(Also..is this the place where we can talk about our irrationally strong hatred of flash mobs? No?)
I dropped my kids off for their first day of school today and there he was — a third-grader wearing a black fedora with a red Angry Bird decal on the side. “Finally,” I thought, “the death knell for the fedora.”
Mallory, I just moved. I JUST MOVED! I don’t know if this gave me a stomach ache of if it the left over chicken and rice I am eating for breakfast because I have so many leftovers from cooking lots of things while having nothing else to do that they are going to start going bad.
Relate.