The Aesthetics Visible from Eating Late
I am not good with crowds.
It is especially noticeable on days when I am not feeling well; being in a crowded place makes me lose my composure and want to run away. This is not a matter of willpower. Nor is it a physical constitution. It is, perhaps, an ideology.
Come to think of it, it is a strange story. Why must people all get hungry at the same time between 12:00 and 13:00? Companies, schools, and society as a whole decide, "Eat at this time." And almost everyone follows that order. The streets are overflowing with people, lines form at restaurants, and lunch menus end at 14:00.
It seems that I am unconsciously rejecting this management.
Hunger is something determined by one's own stomach. It is not determined by the 12:00 time signal. Stomachs do not have built-in clocks. Yet, the sight of everyone pulling back their chairs and standing up in unison at the command "It's noon" has a somewhat totalitarian scent. The post office closes its windows from 11:00 to 14:30. UFJ Bank also goes on a lunch break. Society decides that a certain time is "noon," and everyone is sucked into it. Service was not supposed to be like that, originally.
Sometimes, I suddenly think. Is a lunch eaten alone at a fixed time not "feeding time"?
The command is given. You stand up. You get in line. You put food in your mouth. You return to your seat. Is there a "meal" there? There might be chewing. But is there enjoyment? Is there space? Is there your own will? Animals in a zoo eat what they are given at a fixed time and in a fixed place. They do not complain. Because that is "how things are." I cannot help but overlap that scene with the company cafeteria at 12:00 or the lines at beef bowl chains.
I do not want to eat just to wait in line. I do not want to eat while being jostled.
A meal should originally be a quiet act. Chewing, tasting, and being a little absent-minded. For that, a certain amount of "space" is necessary. A meal eaten at a distance where the person next to you hits your elbow is no longer replenishment; it is not a meal. It is feed. Once, for a work appointment, I was told, "Please avoid 12:00 as it is meal time." I followed the other party's request, but inwardly I was thinking the opposite. 12:00 is when the lounges and cafes are empty. What I always aim for is 1:30 to 2:30. The time when the peak has passed, silence has returned to the shop, and the staff's expressions have more ease. Only then does a meal become a "meal." Not feed.
Before I knew it, this habit had become more than just "avoidance."
By continuing to shift my time, I had acquired a certain ability. An eye to observe human movement objectively. If you continue to stand in a place outside the peak of congestion, you can see that human behavior has rhythm and patterns. Something that should be called the "interval of group psychology." Just before and just after the moment everyone moves. There is always a "gap" there.
It is the same with travel. The period just outside the tourist season has no problems in terms of climate, but airline tickets are clearly cheaper. When there is a long line for the restroom at a popular tourist spot, the restroom on another floor is empty. This is not intuition. It is an accumulation of observation. The reason people decide to "go there" is usually not the result of deep thought. Somehow, because everyone is doing it. Because advertisements say so. The group is moving much more unconsciously than you think. Therefore, if you watch that movement from slightly outside, you can see "where will be empty next." I have almost never been caught in train delays or traffic disruptions due to weather. Either move before it gets crowded, or move after the congestion has cleared. That is all.
This sense can be applied directly to business. When the market is in a frenzy, demand is sometimes born outside that frenzy. When competitors all head toward the same customer segment at once, a neglected segment is sometimes quietly growing. The moment everyone starts saying "this is the correct answer," that answer is already heading toward obsolescence. Reading the hidden side of human behavior is also the essence of marketing. What I have been doing for many years in the field of marriage hunting is close to this if you get down to it. Not "what everyone is looking for," but "what that person really needs," illuminated from a slightly oblique angle. Reading the individual's context, not the group's grammar.
Why did I become this kind of person? When I unravel my past, one answer comes into view. Despite being socially awkward, I have been involved in the service industry for a long time. Even during my time working in a factory, I took the initiative to take the "late meal." That late lunch eaten after 13:00, after the hustle and bustle has subsided. Someone has to go first. If so, I can be later—I have unconsciously repeated that kind of choice.
But thinking about it now, it might not have been just humility. I did not want to be managed. I did not want to line up at feeding time. And the accumulation of that small resistance, without me noticing, cultivated an "eye to see people from the outside."
Do not match the moment society says "now." Stand in a place slightly shifted from the direction people are moving. I think vaguely, while eating my 1:30 lunch, that this is the foundation of my way of living.
"When to eat" is, unexpectedly, continuous with "how to live." Perhaps I have chosen "not to become feed" before "what to eat." That choice was quietly training my eye for reading people.