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rinueDid not get as much work done today as I wanted to. Did some further buffing and formatting of the film. Cooked a little. Sent e-mails. Tinkered with some RE articles. Failed to do sound work, grocery shop, sort through my clothes, do laundry, or get my car inspected.
I went to a barbecue at my friend Travis's - my regular lunch buddy in high school, member with me and C.Blacker of an unofficial poetry club back before at least C and I realized our poems were clever beyond simply amusing ourselves; given that they were about wordplay rather than love or angst, I at least thought they functioned solely as satire and not as poetry. Travis also is about to move.
I did not know anyone else at the party, although Ciro to everyone's surprise did (although he had not met Travis before). It occurred to me that one reason for my increasing social dysfunction is that my ability to make confident small talk has steadily diminished since college. In college, I was interesting. Now, in most situations, I'm worried that if I say anything it will seem like I'm trying to one-up people when all I'm trying to do is the normal "oh yes, I've had an experience similar to that." It just sounds pretentious because my life experiences . . . sound made up for dramatic impact.
1. Everybody else is talking about crazy times they had with early roommates, usually related to people leaving messes in the kitchen or dating unfortunate people. My crazy time with early roommates was living with two Saudi Arabian sisters who had helped spring a political prisoner from jail immediately before they left the country, and who were terrified that the CIA was going to come and get them, not least because there was a CIA guy lurking around, possibly to recruit me, possibly not, and so it was considered wise that I always be the person to answer the door when home.
2. Everybody else was talking about beautiful lake houses they've been in. This made me think about visiting Val in rural Japan, and sitting very happily in the lake house that once belonged to the American diplomats as a summer home and vacation house, now a museum whose main attraction is a screened porch looking over a still and foggy volcanic lake like a scroll painting.
3. Everybody tells their meet cute stories and then want to know how Ciro and I got together, which is complicated and has largely had to be worked out in small pieces through fiction, and is probably not the kind of epic saga people are hoping for when they ask "how did you get together?"
4. And of course people talk about their jobs.
5. Everybody is imagining what it might be like to live in very cold Minnesota (where Travis is moving) and my frame of reference is descriptions of Icelandic winters from my Icelandic friends. And it's very hard for me to talk about the last few years without name dropping "grad school" and "London."
It is really hard for me to figure out how to talk to most people without sounding either dead boring or contemptuous of them. I'm not usually trying to show off; and I don't know how to participate without seeming to show off. It was easier when I was in college, because if I had unusual past history, people figured they'd catch up and I just got a little bit of a head start. But the gap with most (although not all) people keeps widening, partly due to temperament and largely due to luck. I constantly have to pretend even to myself I don't remember things or can't do things. Only what if actually everybody else is doing great things all the time and are similarly afraid to say anything about it?
Otherwise, stopped by Rex's. I wish I knew how I was supposed to act. I wish I could find people it was easy to be around. Liking them doesn't seem to be enough. And maybe this is all stupid because Travis was glad to see me and we had a nice time. But this is why I can't be outgoing anymore, even when I mean to be.
I went to a barbecue at my friend Travis's - my regular lunch buddy in high school, member with me and C.Blacker of an unofficial poetry club back before at least C and I realized our poems were clever beyond simply amusing ourselves; given that they were about wordplay rather than love or angst, I at least thought they functioned solely as satire and not as poetry. Travis also is about to move.
I did not know anyone else at the party, although Ciro to everyone's surprise did (although he had not met Travis before). It occurred to me that one reason for my increasing social dysfunction is that my ability to make confident small talk has steadily diminished since college. In college, I was interesting. Now, in most situations, I'm worried that if I say anything it will seem like I'm trying to one-up people when all I'm trying to do is the normal "oh yes, I've had an experience similar to that." It just sounds pretentious because my life experiences . . . sound made up for dramatic impact.
1. Everybody else is talking about crazy times they had with early roommates, usually related to people leaving messes in the kitchen or dating unfortunate people. My crazy time with early roommates was living with two Saudi Arabian sisters who had helped spring a political prisoner from jail immediately before they left the country, and who were terrified that the CIA was going to come and get them, not least because there was a CIA guy lurking around, possibly to recruit me, possibly not, and so it was considered wise that I always be the person to answer the door when home.
2. Everybody else was talking about beautiful lake houses they've been in. This made me think about visiting Val in rural Japan, and sitting very happily in the lake house that once belonged to the American diplomats as a summer home and vacation house, now a museum whose main attraction is a screened porch looking over a still and foggy volcanic lake like a scroll painting.
3. Everybody tells their meet cute stories and then want to know how Ciro and I got together, which is complicated and has largely had to be worked out in small pieces through fiction, and is probably not the kind of epic saga people are hoping for when they ask "how did you get together?"
4. And of course people talk about their jobs.
5. Everybody is imagining what it might be like to live in very cold Minnesota (where Travis is moving) and my frame of reference is descriptions of Icelandic winters from my Icelandic friends. And it's very hard for me to talk about the last few years without name dropping "grad school" and "London."
It is really hard for me to figure out how to talk to most people without sounding either dead boring or contemptuous of them. I'm not usually trying to show off; and I don't know how to participate without seeming to show off. It was easier when I was in college, because if I had unusual past history, people figured they'd catch up and I just got a little bit of a head start. But the gap with most (although not all) people keeps widening, partly due to temperament and largely due to luck. I constantly have to pretend even to myself I don't remember things or can't do things. Only what if actually everybody else is doing great things all the time and are similarly afraid to say anything about it?
Otherwise, stopped by Rex's. I wish I knew how I was supposed to act. I wish I could find people it was easy to be around. Liking them doesn't seem to be enough. And maybe this is all stupid because Travis was glad to see me and we had a nice time. But this is why I can't be outgoing anymore, even when I mean to be.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-10-04 02:36 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-10-05 11:16 am (UTC)3. I would liiiie. Really ostentatiously, so that everyone would know I was lying. It is not really anyone's business if you don't feel comfortable using it as small talk, even if it's only uncomfortable as small talk because it's complex, and I think most meet cute stories have got to be oversimplified (though maybe only because I've never met anyone who turned out to be important to me in a way that could be summed as a cute one-liner with any accuracy). Silly people. I would totally tell them you were a detective and Ciro was being framed for something and then you realized you had to work together to exonerate him and bring the real art thief to justice so you could still get your fee, because of course in this scenario you needed it for scotch and a new fedora.
4. In my experience, you generally aren't obnoxious about your work. I remember being startled and impressed and then worried I'd offended Ciro because I didn't realize you were teaching little kids and family groups til you specified. I think the film has got to be a harder thing to talk about, and I tend to think of it as being similar to some of the stuff I am doing now, where the industry is seen as glamorous but the work isn't necessarily, and at this stage it is just mainly work and uncertainty and a whole lot of time and money put in without knowing how successful the effort will be. That seems like it would be really accessible to most entrepreneurs, but I often don't want to talk about it because I'm afraid I'll get defensive about how it is hard sometimes, or just sound fretful, and I feel sort of awful lately because I don't know if documenting my independent stuff more would help you feel less lonely or make it worse.
PS. I keep trying to comment to you here and honestly, I feel really shy and self-conscious and intrusive somehow and hope it is not that way in reality. (Especially since I copped to shyness and then went back and wrote a lot.) I'm not really using my dreamwidth account yet, and you already know that I think enthusiasm is kind of sweet and kind of preferable, so I am not sure my rambling in your journal adds anything. But your mention of the volcanic lake makes me think of back in spring when you replied to a comment of mine by getting all thoughtful about the Balcones Escarpment in answer to my curiosity about Dallas and dude, I think I bowed out of the thread prematurely because the pastry conversation was getting more complicated and advisory than I felt comfortable with, but man that made me so smiley because no one has mentioned the Balcones Escarpment to me since I was a really little geeky kid.
So ha! This is the most terribly awkward comment I have written in a long, long time, but I enjoy it when you talk about obscure properly-awesome geology with me as part of random conversation and that is just a fact.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-10-05 06:05 pm (UTC)PS. Geography is the bomb. And I don't know whether I have mentioned it here, but due to the fact that I caption a lot of local weather in a lot of different places, I am almost like a junior meteorologist at this point because I pretty much know what temperature it is everywhere in the United States and which fronts are coming through and how they will feel when they do. It is an interesting passive knowledge to have, and it makes me feel like Mina in Dracula who inexplicably knows all the train tables and makes this relevant to every conversation.
4. Your comments are always welcome and to be honest the one possible cost I weighed about coming over to Dreamwidth was that I might see less of you than on LJ, although I of course still follow your lj. And it is definitely easier to talk to anyone entrepreneurial, whether their entrepreneurship is art related or not. Everybody else thinks I'm bulshitting them when I'm like "um, mostly this means I work really, really, really hard with no reward at all" or figure that means I'm not very good at it. Whereas entrepreneurs or people who work with a lot of entrepreneurs get it. People who think of having "a job" and "retiring" and "getting promoted" - not a lot of overlap in goals or approaches to work or free time. And a lot of people interpret "freelance" (which I'm not currently, but Ciro is) as "unemployed but sounding fancy about it" when in reality it means never having time off, at least for us.
3. I like this lying plan. My mom does this one; she'll just start describing the plot to a movie and see how long it takes anyone to catch on. My Dad is very fond of claiming that any information at all, including what time it is or what he'd like for diner, is classified.
2. I feel that there must be a way to tell stories like this that makes everyone feel fond and connected and like they've gotten to participate in some way or another or can link to something - in a way that is inclusive rather than exclusive. I just get nervous that I'm messing it up.