Grocery store - Very strange encounter today

[ungawa]

My situational awareness is pretty good. But I've been noticing I haven't been carrying myself properly as of late. I try to be a humble man and very polite around strangers in public. I never look down, but try to avoid "inappropriate" eye contact somewhat, so as not to confront people and to leave them alone. Those of you who know what I am talking about already know that my behavior is incorrect.

So, today, I tried to correct my demeanor while out shopping. Anybody who has met me knows I am not a confrontational person, and knows I am polite and smile to people I meet. This is a process of self-improvement, not some drastic change of behavior that happened today.

Long story short, and too long already, I ran into a shopper today. He was about 15 feet from leaving a shopping isle when I turned to go in. He had very aggressive clothing and aggressive tattoos. Living in PA for 3 years, I've learned not to judge people by such things, but that was the vibe he was trying to put out. I checked his waist and then looked at him and he looked back. We looked at each other for at least 3 seconds, and that's a long time. It was a really long time. He freaked out and picked his shopping cart up off the ground and moved it all the way to the side of the isle, smashing into the product on the shelves, to let me pass. Having been a shopper for 25 years, this was the first time I've seen this.

Maybe the guy was a BG. I doubt it. At least, he wasn't a BG today. He was buying groceries. This is not very positive reinforcement for me trying to maintain posture and situational awareness while OC. I was raised to be polite and having others perceive me as adversarial is a sin to my upbringing.

Anybody have any tips on how to carry yourself properly without intruding on peoples' space?

[JIDinPhilly]

You said that you checked out his waist. Did he see your OC?

[Flash]

My situational awareness is pretty good. But I've been noticing I haven't been carrying myself properly as of late. I try to be a humble man and very polite around strangers in public. I never look down, but try to avoid "inappropriate" eye contact somewhat, so as not to confront people and to leave them alone. Those of you who know what I am talking about already know that my behavior is incorrect.

So, today, I tried to correct my demeanor while out shopping. Anybody who has met me knows I am not a confrontational person, and knows I am polite and smile to people I meet. This is a process of self-improvement, not some drastic change of behavior that happened today.

Long story short, and too long already, I ran into a shopper today. He was about 15 feet from leaving a shopping isle when I turned to go in. He had very aggressive clothing and aggressive tattoos. Living in PA for 3 years, I've learned not to judge people by such things, but that was the vibe he was trying to put out. I checked his waist and then looked at him and he looked back. We looked at each other for at least 3 seconds, and that's a long time. It was a really long time. He freaked out and picked his shopping cart up off the ground and moved it all the way to the side of the isle, smashing into the product on the shelves, to let me pass. Having been a shopper for 25 years, this was the first time I've seen this.

Maybe the guy was a BG. I doubt it. At least, he wasn't a BG today. He was buying groceries. This is not very positive reinforcement for me trying to maintain posture and situational awareness while OC. I was raised to be polite and having others perceive me as adversarial is a sin to my upbringing.

Anybody have any tips on how to carry yourself properly without intruding on peoples' space?

What (if anything) did you see at his waist? And did you stop before entering the aisle? He may have percieved any pause or stop as a signal of some sort. And after being on this forum as long as you have, you already know that there are folks (even without tatoos of ANY kind) who will jump to the most highly unwarranted conclusions on little reason, and often for NO reason that any rational human could imagine.

Flash

[wa3ra]

Hey, somebody's gotta be the alpha...

[ungawa]

Not sure what you mean by the tattoos. What did you mean?

I check waists all the time, I saw nothing. I was just looking at him and he looked at me and it continued for about a full three seconds. The encounter started at a distance of about 30 feet. I did not stop my cart and he flipped out before i was within 15 feet. This dude was very serious about getting out of my way.

Back to my question. As a young man, I was a little confrontational with people. Not trying to START confrontations, I just didn't realize how I was being perceived. When I got on the job in the real world in the 90s I had to deal with admin women, and they were not having any of it. That is very painful to a guy raised to be polite like I was. So I spent about a decade trying to be more demure (OMG). Never changed anything about how I deal with my friends or lovers but my public demeanor is a little confused since I was raised to be polite at all times and now I have to evaluate everybody I meet in public.

[Little Cloud]

My situational awareness is pretty good. But I've been noticing I haven't been carrying myself properly as of late. I try to be a humble man and very polite around strangers in public. I never look down, but try to avoid "inappropriate" eye contact somewhat, so as not to confront people and to leave them alone. Those of you who know what I am talking about already know that my behavior is incorrect.

So, today, I tried to correct my demeanor while out shopping. Anybody who has met me knows I am not a confrontational person, and knows I am polite and smile to people I meet. This is a process of self-improvement, not some drastic change of behavior that happened today.

Long story short, and too long already, I ran into a shopper today. He was about 15 feet from leaving a shopping isle when I turned to go in. He had very aggressive clothing and aggressive tattoos. Living in PA for 3 years, I've learned not to judge people by such things, but that was the vibe he was trying to put out. I checked his waist and then looked at him and he looked back. We looked at each other for at least 3 seconds, and that's a long time. It was a really long time. He freaked out and picked his shopping cart up off the ground and moved it all the way to the side of the isle, smashing into the product on the shelves, to let me pass. Having been a shopper for 25 years, this was the first time I've seen this.

Maybe the guy was a BG. I doubt it. At least, he wasn't a BG today. He was buying groceries. This is not very positive reinforcement for me trying to maintain posture and situational awareness while OC. I was raised to be polite and having others perceive me as adversarial is a sin to my upbringing.

Anybody have any tips on how to carry yourself properly without intruding on peoples' space?

Dude sounds like a spaz.

Maybe he was English ... lol.

Since it was your first experience like this, I wouldnt sweat it too hard.

It doesnt happen every day, right?

[jcabin]

Maybe he thought you were looking at his ballaz? Ungawa to encounter the first hoplomophobe.

[S&WM&P40]

where you carrying? If so was it open or concealed. Maybe he saw you printing or saw your open carried firearm and maybe he was from NY or NJ.

[jcabin]

where you carrying? If so was it open or concealed. Maybe he saw you printing or saw your open carried firearm and maybe he was from NY or NJ.

He was open carrying

[vette97]

Sounds like my first encounter with ungawa. However, after 3 seconds he turned HIS head first and opened up with something suppressed, full auto. I considered this extremely friendly and non-confrontational. Keep up the good work!