Judgmental

I have a judgmental streak going way back. I see somebody, blam! instant opinion, based on what the Germans call Augenblick,( literally, "eye blink.")

This weekend, we took the camper and went to the coast. Dianne was exhausted from a long and difficult week at work, and even though it was going to be cloudy and cool, we have a pretty full schedule at home the next few weeks, so we decided to go for it.

So we're set up, the county park is half-empty, quiet, and a camper pulls in nearby. Guy, mid-thirties, maybe; two little girls, about nine and six. Another car pulls in behind them, and I figure it's the wife. She gets out, and I revise my opinion slightly -- it's the trophy wife.

She had long, bottle-blond hair, piled high; wore an expensive, designer sweatsuit, cut to show the navel; expensive sunglasses, not the least bit necessary. Her face was an unnatural bronze color that indicated heavy makeup or a fake tan, and had no wrinkles, so maybe Botox. I guessed her to be mid-thirties, trying to look mid-twenties. Fit, busty, trim.

After watching them set-up their camp -- a canopy over the picnic table, chairs next to the fire pit, the usual, I revised my appraisal yet again: Not a trophy wife, but a new girlfriend.

Married folks, or long-time couples, have a kind of energy about them and I didn't detect it. She was not the mother of the little girls, and the three of them took turns trying to get daddy's attention. The blond help set stuff up, but she had that helpless, clumsy look that indicated she hadn't done this particular chore before.

She could have been a fine young woman just not used to outdoorsy stuff, but my gut reaction was that she was -- not to put too fine a point on it -- a bimbo.

Well, well, Mr. Judgmental sneers down his nose again ...

If I were being fair, I'd have dropped round, said hello, and engaged them in conversation to see how accurate my assessment was. She could have been Mensa member with a Ph.D. in quantum mechanics, though a couple hours of applying makeup every morning would cut into her research time.

I did walk by with the dogs, and discovered that none of them were dog people. Generally, when I'm out with Jude and Layla, who are passing cute, dog people will come out of their RVs or trailers to say hello. Especially the guilty ones who left their dogs at home ...

Everybody has to be somewhere, and even airheads need love, so I don't begrudge the woman her right to share the communal air, but she was so dead-0n a type that it tickled me.