2004, Personal

On Self-Deprecation

See, I’m a philosopher. My titles begin with “On.”

In the CD player: Quadrophenia by the Who (yes, I’m on a Who kick). Just a note about this album. This album, despite it being a rock opera and slightly proggy, is very proto-punk-ish. Lots of emphasis on simple chord progressions and the story’s about rebellious youths from the working class. Lots of stuff about adolescent frustration. Just so you know.

So, self-deprecation. As you many know (or may not know), I tend to have a slightly self-deprecating sense of humour (that occasionally makes others so uncomfortable as to say “Don’t be so hard on yourself”). I have just realized though that it sometimes takes me awhile to get to that point, if you follow. That is to say, that for me to make fun of something that has happened to me, it can (if it was serious enough) take a good deal of time to make it into my repertoire of self-directed barbs. Case in point:

I decided that when I am trying to convey my lack of success with girls, I should say, “I’m so bad with women, one girl I almost dated told all her friends I was gay!” Zing! This is true. The thing is, it took me a very long time to get to the point where I was willing to use it as a joke. Almost two years. This is interesting because sometimes I can instantly (or relatively instantly) make fun of myself for something. I guess it depends on what that something is. Apparently, this girl telling all her friends I was gay had a bigger impact on my psyche than I originally decided. I have told people about it, but not in a jokey sense. But now it seems really funny (I should mention, though, that this is the first time I’ve thought about it in 6 months or more, so that could affect the time calculations). Really, really funny. It seriously is a punchline. I don’t know why I thought about it, but I almost started laughing. Something made me think about Australia for some reason.

I guess you’d be wanting the story now. I don’t know whether to say we “dated” or “almost dated” or what. Some people seem to define dating as seeing someone once. I think people often do this so they can claim they’ve had more gfs or bfs than they’ve actually had. Why people do this is beyond me. By this notion, I dated my stepsister’s roommate’s friend this summer. Which I did not. She didn’t let it happen. But back to the point. I saw this girl (in Australia) more than once. But not in any formal “date” sense. Or at least, I didn’t think so. Maybe I was mistaken (this would be very, very likely…how often does Riley know what’s going on in a girl’s head? – especially one he might be interested in? – The answer is, of course, virtually never). You know what, I was totally on a date one of those times at least and just didn’t realize it. More than likely.

So, I met this girl at a party. She was flirting with all of us male exchange students, if memory serves me. Eventually, somehow, she got talking to me. Oh yeah, we had to go to my house to get more booze or something along those lines. Being drunk, I guess I was flirtier than I normally am (this is debatable since I rarely seem to know when I’m being “flirty”…people keep telling me I was and I don’t realize it). Anyway, we appeared to have a lot in common despite our 3 year age difference (appeared is the operative word; I think it was 3 years, it might have been 2…anyway, she’s almost as young as my brother, if not younger). This got me very excited but being me, I was being very passive (probably told myself I was “taking it slow” ahahaha). I also, as usual, managed to convince myself she wasn’t interested in me (the logic is something like this: I never have any success with girls so no girls like me so this girl can’t possibly like me…wow I sound like Joel). As a sidenote, I usually have one of two attitudes when I’m drunk and I encounter a girl I think I like or want to bang or something: a) (if I’m really really drunk) I make a horrible attempt at making a pass; b) I decide it’s too bad that I’m interested because I’m not gonna get anywhere. Fortunately or unfortunately, I picked the latter (it could have been based on how drunk I was but I was pretty drunk). So I somehow ignored all her blatant suggestions that we make out and instead tried to talk to her more. Hahahaha, that is so like me. I even made it to her room at one point (her roommate thought I had spent the night actually). Anyway, all I got out of it was her phone number (which is something) and the impression that I had met a girl I shared a lot with and there was some real potential there (I can be overly romantic sometimes, I apologize).

The “date” we went on was watching a movie at her house. So it might not have been a date. But she definitely made efforts that I had trouble responding to (being me). I wanted to, at first. I was trying to figure out how (I’m always convinced I’m gonna get rejected, as you may or may not know). But some of the similarities I thought we had shared were turning into things we didn’t share. I know I’m not clear, but it was weird. She had me totally convinced on the first night that she liked some prog rock (seriously, how often do you meet a girl who genuinely likes prog rock?) but it turned out that she didn’t. Her parents did. Hahaha. And her personality was…different I guess. I’m sure mine was too. But it was weird. At the end, I awkwardly tried to kiss her briefly and got absolutely nowhere. Big surprise.

The second sober time I saw her…or maybe the third…am I forgetting something? Well, no matter. The next time, we’ll call it. The next time, there were other people around. I had an audience! We all know how I respond to an audience. Hahaha. Let’s just say that didn’t go well. At the same time as I was virtually frozen about how to pursue her (I’m such a fucking teenager…I was! I was! I’m not any more! Seriously! Hahaha), her personality began to remind me more and more of my stepsister. Enough said about that. Then, in front of me (though I didn’t realize what she said at the time), she told her friend she thought I was gay. She mouthed it is why. I later found out because it got back to me. And often, your understanding of a situation imprvoes with reflection (and often it also gets more cloudy). So, that’s the story in all its glory.

Why did I bother writing this down now? I has nothing to do with Hamilton. Why is this relevant? Why do you care? Because I wanted to procrastinate and this provided me with the opportunity for ample procrastination.

Be seeing you.

Um, I forgot to tell you the end.

Because she reminded me of [redacted], we had virtually nothing in common, and she was pretty immature (and because she told her friends – not just the one there, and some of my friends – that I was gay) I pretty much ignored her. I would say hi when I saw her (though she’d deny this, she claimed I never said hi…she either never heard me or she’s an asshole) and that was it. I didn’t explain why I just stopped trying to talk to her. Probably should have told her. Whatever. Doesn’t matter.

One other funny thing I forgot to tell you about this is that she kept thinking she saw me (both during and after) and it wasn’t me. So I guess she didn’t totally know what I looked like. Hahaha. And I wanted to get to know her more…

Be seeing you.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.