General Admission

It was a a black box theatre, about 40 seats total. For the 7 pm show, the doors opened for seating at about 6:50. She was right behind me, the 4th person to enter. She sat down beside me in the first row, in the middle. There were a couple of empty seats to her [our] right and to my left, two empties. We sat, chatting lightly with our programs in hand. At about 7:10, a group of 4 young people entered the space and we noticed them, because they stood in front of us. ” We would like to sit together, would you mind moving down’, they asked her as she was on the ‘end’. She didn’t answer. ‘Are you saving those seats for someone?” they asked her as a follow-up.  She didn’t answer. ‘We would like to sit together and if you are not saving those seats, and would just move down…’ They said. She got up and moved down. I followed her. That left 4 seats smack in the middle of the front row. As they were collecting themselves to be seated she turned to them, from her now end seat. “If you want to sit there, all together, I suggest you arrive before those of us who are already seated. There is no reason, that your coming late, entitles you to ask those already seated to move so that you can be seated in a row. I got here early, so I could sit exactly where I wanted to sit in a general admission and I resent your asking me to move. You are not to be chatting during the performance anyway, so what does it matter, and in fact it is quite rude to ask others, who have arrived on time and chosen exactly where they want to sit, to move to accommodate you.” And then she was silent. I was silently cheering inside. The 4 looked at her, mumbled among themselves and then said, ‘Here, have your seat back…mumble, mumble…’ and they went to the 2nd or 3rd row to find seats. There was some accent mumbling in those rows to accommodate them, but on the whole there was little commotion.  We did not move back.  At 7:20 it was not yet begun when 4 late comers arrived and to their delight, found seats empty in the front row.