Savvy Rumblings

Ever watch the show “Dexter”? I can totally relate to Dexter Morgan. Not because he’s a serial killer, but because his approach to understanding the paradoxical complexities of people and human interaction is similar to my own. Dexter doesn’t experience natural human emotions and therefore is unable to comprehend the minutiae of existence. In my own way I don’t get it either. It’s like watching a martial arts flick and being unable to sit back and watch the action because you’re completely aware of the digital effects and wirework. You think, “This isn’t real, this is all bullshit!” and can’t focus.

I cringe when thinking back on my childhood memories because I’m reminded of all those awkward social situations I could have handled better. I envy those with nostalgia for their childhood because I wouldn’t want to relive the stupid questions I used to ask or the goofy way I’d behave. And any encounter with a girl…seriously, jab me with a cattle prod so I won’t have to remember any of that.

It didn’t help that when puberty hit my voice became monotonous. When I talked to people they’d either laugh or parrot back what I said in a cruel imitation of my own voice. It also didn’t help that my natural facial expression is rather emotionless. Soon people assumed I was this ultra Zen motherfucker who didn’t experience human emotions. But I did. I felt everything, I just couldn’t emote it like everybody else could.

To fit in I learned how to control the tone of my voice, to enunciate in the right place, and to emote when necessary. Otherwise it would amuse people the way I spoke. Even now I’ll forgot to modulate my voice and someone will laugh or repeat what I say in that mocking tone.

To this day social interaction is incredibly frustrating. Forcing myself to control the way I speak, making sure to open my eyes wider and smile at the right times, doing the proper handshake, laughing at things I don’t find funny just makes me not want to make the effort. It all feels so fake but much like Dexter Morgan I learned how to go from being a rather socially uneducated kid to an adult who can hold a conversation without coming off like a psycho. It’s been worth all the effort, but it annoys me that I have to recraft my persona in order to appease others.

One day when I’m a single old hermit living alone in the dark and not leaving the house will I truly be at peace.

• Question: What are your most & least favorite vices? - kamrabbit
• Answer:

  Least favorite: Ignorance

  Most favorite: Generosity

• Question: What is your least favorite form of communication? - kamrabbit
• Answer:

  Silence.

• For the last few months my company has been making instructional videos for our customers. They asked me to do the voiceovers, even though I hate the sound of my voice. A month ago they made a DVD of all the videos and now a TV in the lobby plays them on an endless loop. Every time I go to the bathroom I hear the sound of my voice. It’s surreal and aggravating.
• Some of my best friends are smarter than me. It’s weird to think like that because I don’t like to think I’m smarter than other people, but it’s weird knowing you can’t match the intelligence level of your contemporaries.
• Finally caved and bought a PlayStation 3. It’s weird to own expensive things. I remember being a kid and always wanting stuff, the desire to possess threatening to burn a hole through my heart. In some ways being able to have stuff now is both satisfying and strangely empty.

From time to time I’m reminded of an episode of “Battlestar Galactica” where President Laura Roslin is forced to compromise on an issue and says to her opponent, “You got your pound of flesh.” This is important for two reasons: 1) The line is a reference to William Shakespeare’s “The Merchant of Venice” and 2) “Battlestar Galactica” takes place in a galaxy far from our own. If we assume that the world of the show is reality, then what are the chances that Roslin (who is basically an alien) would know that particular idiom?

Where do ideas even come from? I know some philosophers believe that ideas are just floating in the ether and we stand on our metaphorical step ladders plucking these thought apples from the tree of knowledge. If I get a notion to fill my pockets with rocks and then walk into a river, am I doing so because it’s an original thought? Or am I doing it because Virginia Woolf had the same idea all those years ago and I’m unknowingly replicating her?

It’d be amazing if thoughts and feelings and events echoed back in the time. That right now we’re experiencing reverberations from an almighty event hundreds of years in the future. That a sudden pang of sadness could be attributed to the pain of future offspring. And what if that sadness that infected me shot backward into the 18^th century? Or what if an idea jackknifed through eons of time like light refracted endlessly through a prism? What a universe that would be.

Think of your most base emotions: anger, jealousy, happiness, lust. Now imagine meeting someone thousands of miles away. They’d know what all of those things feel like, maybe even more acutely than you. How can some Mongolian I’ve never met understand my pain? Perhaps it’s hubris to think that we’re all individual islands living in quiet existence, completely cordoned off from the rest of humanity. The idea that our ideas or elements of our personality may not be original can be infuriating but I take comfort in knowing some things are universal. In my heart I hope there’s an unknowable link between all of us. Because if this is all there is, then that would just suck.

I’m in Las Vegas. The November desert air is choking me, evaporating any remaining moisture in my throat. I don’t mind. I have nothing to say. I’m alone in a bar. An Irish bar. Inside a pyramid-shaped casino. Oddly enough it’s got the same name and design as a bar back home. Didn’t realize it was a chain.

I sit at the bar and order the cheapest beer they have, which happens to be four bucks and has an English sounding name. The bartender is an Irish woman with crooked teeth, but something about her black top makes her attractive to me. I want to talk to her. Ask her how a lass like her makes the trip across the pond to this big desert of sin in Nevada. But I don’t. I sip my beer in silence and look around.

To my left is a group of men, cheery to the point of annoyance. Their blissful ignorance makes me jealous. I think about talking to them. Striking up a conversation. “Hi, my name is [name]. I’m from [city]. I’m here for [reason]. Do you like [something interesting]? How about this [weather/sports team/something tangentially related to the bar]?” I’ve become skilled in coming up with inane conversation starters but staring at these guys none of it seems relevant. I don’t bother them. On my right I see an entitled woman remind her waiter about the order she placed 15 minutes ago. Her noxious tone makes me sick.

On a makeshift stage an Irish band plays music. Irish-y music. It’s good but I’m distracted by the violin player. A redhead with beautiful freckles freckled all across her lovely freckly face. In 30 seconds I’m in love. I imagine a home with this woman. I’m tired and stressed, she enters the room with her flaming red hair and plays the violin. I’m entranced by the rhythms of her hands, the paleness of her flesh. She whispers sweet Celtic nothings into my ear. I don’t have a care in the world. But I’m in the bar and she’s on stage. All the sweet music in the world can’t change the fact that I’m there alone and I’ll never see her again.

I order another beer, sip it slowly and then quickly. I realize how much my feet hurt from walking all day and dread the trek back to my hotel room. After I pay the tab I leave and I think how little my presence was felt by the people in that bar. In the massive scheme of time it’s a minor moment but it’s amazing how lonely you can feel in the midst of so many people.

After some blood tests it looks like I have an ulcer/bacterial infection. Now I have to take 8 pills a day for 2 weeks. I’ve strangely been feeling slightly better on my own for the past day or so, but I’m still glad I found out what’s been making me feel so terrible the past month or so.

• I once got rejected without even putting myself out there. In middle school I knew a beautiful girl named Tami. Some asshole in the cafeteria thought it would be funny to run over to her table and tell her that I liked her (which I didn’t, I just thought she was pretty). I remember the kid whispering into her ear and a look of revulsion appearing on her face. Then she looked directly at me and mouthed the words, “I DON’T LIKE YOU.”
• It just occurred me to I have never once told anyone the above story even though I think about it every now and then.
• I really want to buy a PlayStation 3. I’ve thought about it over and over for the past few days, and sporadically for the last few years. I’m not one to spend money on large items so it’d be a big deal for me to get one.
• My stomach’s been bothering me for well over a month now. I thought I discovered that I’m lactose intolerant but lately I seem to get an upset stomach whenever I eat. Seeing a doctor today.
• Last week while I was driving around I had a morbid daydream. I imagined going to the doctor and finding out I had stomach cancer. But instead of crying and asking what the treatment options are, I calmly walk out and go about living my life. I don’t tell anyone that I’m sick and I don’t try to get better, pretty much just allowing myself to die naturally. What snapped me back to reality was the thought that it would be incredibly painful and that my mother would be so furious.

I’m waiting for doors that never open, phone calls that never make my phone buzz, the unbelievable to be feasible. I’m waiting for the smile of the right person, the handshake from the right stranger, the touch of the right girl. I’m hoping that I can step out the front door and not get drowned in ash, sleep and not get smothered by incendiary nightmares, relax without fear of my heart spelunking into my stomach. Bad things that turn nice, stillness and coolness, no heat, smoke, and sweat.

I can stand on a hill and watch the world unfurl before my eyes. It goes back as far as I can see and, in my eyes, it ends exactly where I see it end. Too bad. You’d think it could go further. You’d think we could all go further, see further, live further. I can turn around and see more, turn to my left and see that, or turn to my right and see some of that there, too. Amazing. So far to go and no way to get there. And then I look up. No sign of distance at all. Endless imagination. Just the way I like it.

sassywondergrrl replied to your post: Kal-El: Musings About Culture and Identity

OH MY GOD YOU MEAN YOU’RE NOT JUST REALLY TAN?!? MIND=BLOWN

I was in the oven too long :(