We are members of First Congregational United Church of Christ of Bellingham. Our church building is also home to Garden Street United Methodist Church. Among the things the two congregations share is a bell choir. As a member of the choir, I rang in two services yesterday. The first was the 10 am service of First Congregational. The second was the 2:30 pm service of Garden Street. It was a beautiful day, so Susan and I walked downtown for lunch between the two services. The walk and the lunch offered good opportunities to people watch, something we both enjoy.

The mayor of Bellingham has described it as a small city in the process of becoming a mid-sized city. the population is just under 100,000 people and growing. That is roughly double the number of people who lived in the city in 1990. Bellingham has its share of problems. There is a housing shortage that has driven up the cost of living in the city. When we were shopping for a house, we looked win Bellingham, but didn’t find what we were looking for in our price range. Homes are a bit less expensive in the smaller town where we live. There are a number of people in Bellingham who don’t have anyplace to live and who survive on the streets with the assistance of the services of various agencies. Our church participates in several outreach programs to assist those with no homes including housing a day shelter for homeless youth in our building and a partnership with a tiny homes project.

We walked a bit less than a mile from our church to the restaurant. Along the way we saw several people who appeared to be homeless. There was a small gathering of folk in the parking lot of an accounting firm with several shopping carts and other items spread about. I suppose it is possible they had camped in the parking lot overnight, but it is also possible that they were simply using a space that is vacant on weekends but full on weekdays as a gathering spot for the day. The weather was beautiful and it was pleasant to be outside, so they did not need to seek shelter and an open lot worked as a place to be for a while.

We greeted a few folks as we walked. Bellingham is a friendly place and people often say “Hello” to strangers. One person asked us if we wanted to buy some flowers, but we declined. Others simply greeted us as we walked.

We had lunch in a popular bagel cafe and there was a steady stream of customers. We had to wait for a table to become available. Our table was near the line of people waiting to place their orders. Some people were waiting for orders to carry out and were standing. We had a good view of all of the action from our small table.

I saw an older gentleman wearing a silky black shirt over mis-matched shorts above his feet adorned in socks and sandals. Casual wear is common, and this gentleman seemed to be taking advantage of that custom. It looked like he had gotten up from sleep and slipped into his sandals without bothering to get dressed before heading to the cafe. A family of four went through the line. One of the boys had long hair like the father. The other had short hair like the mother. As I looked at them, thinking that the hair styles would have raised eyebrows in my hometown, I wondered if that is still the case. Times have changed since I was growing up. Maybe the town where male students were suspended from school for wearing their hair long enough to touch their shirt collar has changed its attitudes towards hair length. At any rate none of the members of that particular family were wearing shirts with collars, so technically there was no hair on collars.

I observed people with a variety of tattoos and piercings in some places that looked to me like it would have been painful to get them. I joked to Susan that I was being really counter cultural. I was dressed for church with a dress shirt and slacks and a bow tie. I was the only person we saw in the cafe wearing a tie and I suppose that other customers who enjoy people watching might have commented about how I didn’t fit into the crowd with my unique choice of clothing. “Who wears a tie these days?” One other member of our bell choir wore a tie yesterday and I think we were the only ones in both services who were so dressed.

The employees of the restaurant all wore t-shirts with the name of the restaurant silk screened on them. The shirts came in different colors and different lengths. I didn’t see any tucked into pants and some of the women wore shirts that were cropped. Perhaps they chose those short shirts to show of their belly button piercings.

I never know whether or not it is impolite to comment on a tattoo that is partially covered by clothing. Does the person want me to notice and ask about their body art, or are they covering part of it because it is none of my business? I usually don’t mention tattoos and piercings in casual conversations with strangers.

There were many groups of people who came into the restaurant whose relationships were unclear. Couples could have been just friends or they might be romantically involved. There is no way to tell from casual observation of them eating lunch. People seemed to be enjoying a relaxed day. I didn’t see anyone working on a laptop or groups that might have been business lunches. Even though most people do not attend church, Sundays are still days of leisure for many people.

Because Susan was not staying for the second service, we had arrived at the church in two different vehicles. I wonder what a stranger might think of a couple of people in their seventies, both over dressed for casual Bellingham, who arrived at church in separate vehicles, worshipped and then walked to lunch before leaving in their individual vehicles at different times. It might not be obvious that we have been married for more than 50 years.

I hope they had as much fun making up stories about us as I did making up stories about them.