We enter the electronics store. We have a mission. The plan is to buy a new laptop, a mini me that can travel with me around the world and anywhere else. The clerks are standing around a register discussing their activities of the prior evening. We stand next to them.   They do not notice us. We check each computer in the store, play a game on one, and check prices. No one comes to see if we want to buy. We leave.

                A restaurant, a café, someplace where it is necessary to be served. I ask for a menu from a waiter so they will know we are there. We sit close to the door. The waiter comes and serves the table next to us then walks past us back into the restaurant. Next the waiter comes and serves the table across from us and then gets orders from the table behind us. We wave and wave. Finally we stand up and wave and then the waiter comes. We repeat the process to pay our bill. Why do I think that if we stood up and just started to walk away that we would be very visible?

                Sitting in the plane next to the window. The flight attendant approaches with the snack and drink cart. She asks the two ladies sitting next to me if they want anything. They ask what they can get for whatever amount of change they have in the local currency. She sells them a snack and moves on down the aisle to the next row. The ladies have to poke her to get her to come back and give me a drink.

                Into the furniture store. In the market for a new bed. That's expensive and one would think the salesclerks would be all over us. Nothing. There are three other customers in the store and about 5 men working in the store. We wave at one and he waves back but does not approach. After looking at all the beds and prices and never seeing a clerk come close, we leave.

                A restaurant on the sea shore. Many people sitting at tables outside for the sunset and the breeze. We take an empty table in the crowd and press of people. There are only a few empty tables left and the waitresses are moving around taking orders. They pass by our table and do not stop to see if we want anything. After a few minutes, we go ask for a menu in English. We sit longer without anyone coming for an order. The table next to us has a new customer sit downs. The wait staff comes to his table immediately. We signal that we are ready to order. We are not seen. We leave.

                A jewelry store, an expensive jewelry store. I’ve gotten dressed up for the occasion, knowing that sometimes I seem to be invisible to clerks. My thought is that they will see I have money and come forward to sell me something. It doesn’t happen. Clerks talk to each other. A customer enters after me, another customer enters. Both are scooped up by clerks and are taken to the section of jewelry in which they express an interest. I am ignored. I go to another store where it only takes 10 minutes standing by a clerk to get noticed and buy my jewelry.

                A brewery where hubby likes to sample the micro brews made locally. Usually you can get a taster, several of their beers in small glasses. The bartender does not see us. I walk to the other end of the bar. Neither one of us is seen. Hubby waves his arms and finally attracts notice and gets his beer.

                Hotel bar and café. You can sit and use the internet. There are menus where you can get small snacks or expensive wines and beers. A glass of wine is $20 so you would think you would like to sell some. Beers are $15 each. One evening here, no one comes. Next evening here, we are asked within 5 minutes but we don’t want anything tonight. Next evening, it takes 10 minutes before we are asked if we want a drink. Hubby gets a beer. 10 minutes later his beer comes. I say I would like a drink but she walks away. My voice is low so possibly she didn’t hear. She returns in 20 minutes (I know the time because a timer was counting down my internet time) I order one of the wines. It comes 30 minutes later. Had I not had a lot of internet business we would have been long gone. She could have drunk the wine herself then.

                Car dealership, a used car dealership, reputations for pushiness. Forty minutes in the showroom without a single salesman approaching us. As there are many car dealerships, we are ready to leave when someone finally sees us and comes over to see if we want to buy a car. We have already been sitting in cars and kicking tires just to see if they notice us. He says, just saw you walk in the door. A line definitely or he is very time challenged.

                Another local restaurant, a different city, a different country. I walk up to the hostess to make her seat us so that we will get service. She puts us in a room where there are not as many people nor any cigarette smoke either. 30 minutes later we leave without ever having seen a waitress. The hostess thanks us for coming as we walk past her.

                These are small examples. These things happen to us all the time. We aren’t bad looking people, we aren’t dressed shabbily, we don’t sit in the corner in the dark, and yet we can be ignored in the best to the worst of places that we visit, and in whatever country we visit. Has service become so bad that service staff and wait people and salesclerks just don’t care anymore? Or are we truly sometimes invisible? Is anyone else invisible too? As we get older, do we get more invisible?   If this is true, why can’t I be invisible and walk onto airplanes and get free rides? Why can’t I be invisible when I want to be? What does the future look like if we slowly fade away to invisibility and no one sees us at all?