Personal Space

What is it with people feeling the need to invade personal space? I thought Americans were more known for needing that “wing span” of space and knowing to give people space. I know that in some countries, people move in much closer and are less needing of personal space that we are in America…But in this country there are just certain things you adhere to. For example, if you are at the movie theater, and it’s quiet, and there are a lot of open seats, you don’t take the seat directly next to someone you don’t know, or sit directly in front of behind them, out of respect for their space. In a public restroom, if there are few people in there, and there are a lot of stalls, you don’t take the stall right next to one in use, you leave at least one between you…just the common things that most people seem to recognize as unwritten rules…or maybe I’m just weird, but these are things I’ve observed happening so I can’t be the only one!! Anyway, today I finally made my goal of getting out of bed early and getting to the gym before work. I have been wanting to get up and do that 2-3 times a week to strength train, saving a drive during lunch and getting a good start to the day (at least in theory). So I got up, got myself ready (did hair and makeup since I don’t necessarily sweat a lot during strength training) and went off to the gym. Had my workout done and was changing to head to work…now the lockers at the gym are U shaped and there are a number of these U shaped sections all lined with lockers (as most gyms are set up). They have 3 lockers on each of the legs of the U that are tall, and then 3 others that are short with 1 stacked on top of the other. I tend to take the shorter ones, next to the taller one (as they aren’t often used) on the bottom for ease of getting into and out of. I got back to my locker, had it open and my stuff spread out, getting myself dressed and getting stuff shoved back in the bag. I was taking up my share of space, but at this time of the day, the gym was very, very quiet…in fact in this space I was in, there was only one other person. And she had just arrived and was getting ready to get out for her workout. She asks me if I’m using the locker next to me, the tall one…I said no…then she takes her coat and sticks it in. Then she kind of moves my coat (which is laying in front of the locker door, this locker is open) and then asks if that is my coat, which I said yes, it was, she moves it, shuts the door and then puts it back…all this time I was looking around, the 3 tall lockers on the other side, where no one was, were all free…in fact one of the was partly open and you could see it was not in use…WHY did she have to have the one next to me??? Or why couldn’t she wait till I had moved? I get the idea of using the same locker each time. Honestly I do. I tend to do that and get in a habit of it…but if someone is there and I have to disturb them to get to it, I adapt and use a different one…I heard someone talking on the radio earlier this week too about having been at a Starbucks recently, sitting alone at one of their small tables, one that is meant for one person or, at most two, but only if you are sitting very intimately…she had her stuff spread over the table and was reading. A woman came over and asked a lady next to her if she could share the table with her. The woman sitting told the new woman that she was meeting someone…the woman then came to the radio person and asked her. The radio person looked around and saw there were many open tables and pointed that out…the new woman said they were all undesirable cause they were by the line…so the radio person gave her the go ahead. Woman took over the table…radio person finally told her she would go take one of the other tables and left. Now me, personally, would not have let the new woman sit there, cause I’m kind of a bitch sometimes, but how rude is that to ask someone even? It’s one thing if it’s a big table and there aren’t other places to sit, but when there are places to sit…