Improper Poll: Wave Away

Years ago, an elderly man used to stand next to a busy street near here and hold up a sign advertising roses. He’d wave as people drove by. It was quaint. It was sweet. And it was so impressive that a man his age could withstand the elements—not to mention holding his arm up all day—that he was a bit of a legend in my area. The local paper even did an article on him. We always waved back. He was our friend even though we’d never met him. He was affectionately known as The Rose Man.

I haven’t seen The Rose Man in many years, but apparently before he left, he went forth and populated our town with waving, sign-holding Progeny-from-Hell. They are everywhere.

Yesterday I drove down that same busy street, which is admittedly even busier. We passed dueling, dancing rival pizza slices on either side of the street, some tax people, the person holding up a sign advertising “We Buy Gold,” someone in a gorilla suit (no idea why), somebody holding up a sign that might have been for birth control services or possibly against them, I couldn’t tell which, and someone else whose sign was much too small for me to read and might have been picketing something. All of them were dancing around and/or waving.

At the risk of sounding crotchety, all that leaping and gyrating and sign holding and waving annoyed the hell out of me and made it hard to drive. It was like having a bunch of little kids scream at the top of their lungs at the same time, “Look at me! No, me! Me me me!!!”

The worst was one I saw the other day. I don’t know what she was advertising, but I got a good look at her from behind while waiting for my light to change. She was obviously so cold and so tired that she’d hold her sign up a while and then let it drop, then stumble out what might have been a half-hearted little jig or possibly a foot that had fallen asleep. Either way, it looked painful. And it made me hate the company she works for, honestly, for making a person suffer through that.

So my improper questions for today are, do you have those waving, sign holding people in your area? And if so, do you feel obligated to wave back? Do they really get your business, or do they drive it away? Do you wave at little kids going by on amusement park trains, and why do we pretend that’s a parade when it isn’t?