So I took a poll today. Turns out that I am officially the third least interesting person in my entire university, ranking only behind the chick who's writing her thesis on the comparative evolutions of the common rock barnacle (v. boringus) and the speckled beach barnacle (x. mindnumbingus) and the first place winner, the boy who collects paint samples of his favourite colour - taupe. And the fact that he would care about such a thing is probably based on some strange psychological condition of his, which would thus make him interesting. So that makes me the second most boring being on campus. Add to this the fact that I completely made up the barnacle girl and taupe boy, the conclusion can be reached that I am severely uninteresting.
I wouldn't necessarily say that I'm dull, because I see dull and uninteresting as being two different things. If I was dull, I wouldn't wear offensively violently-coloured clothing, which I do, and I wouldn't walk around yelling "THIS ISSS LESLIIIEEE" in my creepy-guy-on-Youtube voice or doing my Nicki-on-Video-on-Trial-Britany-Spears-Impression, which I most certainly do (usually, I do it after every meal, when I have a food baby - GIMME GIMME...). But being legally insane doesn't actually make me interesting. To me, someone who's interesting is a person who has an ability, talent or deep knowledge of something that I don't. Basically, if someone's passionate about something, that makes them interesting. So where does that leave me? What do I like? Well, I like lots of things - guitar, clothing, history, movies, whales, pogs (althought that's really more nostalgia than a current interest), pop rocks, most of my friends, Risk, the Old West, yada yada yada. But am I passionate about anything? Meh. Am I talented? Nope. And I haven't been 'smart' since Grade 8. I mean, sure, I can name the four stomachs of a cow, but that's just useless fact, not knowledge (besides, who can't?). What I really want is to be GOOD at something. And not just 'pretty good,' but the kind of good that makes people go "Sheesh! She's GOOD!" But I kind of already feel that it's too late. Now is the time that I want to be able to show off. I mean, sure, I could sit and practise guitar every day until I'm fifty and become utterly fantastic, but, in the immortal words of the girl who turns into a blueberry in the Gene Wilder version of Willie Wonka, "I want it NOOOW!". I want to be able to impress people with the dazzling abilities that I don't have. But it doesn't matter anyway, because everyone knows that you can't force yourself to be passionate about something. You can like some things more than other things, but when you're passionate, I suspect that you're not in the dark about it. You just know. It's all you can think about. And of course, I'm assuming all of this, because I'm passionate about nada.
I enjoy a lot of things, but I have yet to come across anything that I like enough that it's always on my mind. And that I'm darn good at. I'm not going to lie, I've developed an unlikely and fairly impressive hula-hoop ability, but that's a party trick, not a passion. And besides, there's not really enough room to hula-hoop in rez rooms anyway. I mean, heck, even Science Wing Kids have their uncanny Dungeons and Dragons/Manga-drawing skills. And while these skills may not impress the general population, they at least impress other SWKs, which is better than I'm doing.
The other problem is that I'm a phony. I've never had to spell phony before and it looks kind of weird and possibly incorrect. Nevertheless, it's true. I mean, does anyone really know who they are, internal window to the soul, blah, blah, we get it, everyone feels that, now move on. But I feel like I've lived a sheltered-ish sort of life. Which has definitely had a positive effect on my health and psychological well-being. But *DEEP ALERT! DEEP ALERT!* I feel like I'm not real. And in this case, I mean italics-real, not lost-in-the-cosmos real. It just seems to me that if I ever do find that I'm interested in something, what is my first reaction? Woogle. That right there was a fusion of Wiki and Google. So I insta-Woogle anything that I'm interested in. And I kind of feel like that's cheating. Take, for example, the blues. That there is my fave genre of music. I want to know more about its history. What do I do? Woogle. But isn't that a contradiction, because the blues at its core is about the oral tradition, passing stories, lessons and information from one generation to the next through song. I doubt that I just expressed my feelings very well, but to me, using the modern to learn about the timeless makes me feel like a fraud. That was beautiful and emo.
So, long story short, I'm an uninteresting, untalented, unintelligent, woogling phony. I'll be sure to let you know if this changes.
Wow. I am so sorry that this is so long. If you made it to the end, you officially win the game (yeah, I have the power to do that. No big.).
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3 comments:
tbh Mickie, I feel the exact same way. I'm good at a lot of things, I like a lot of things, but I'm not great at anything. I'm not out of the ordinary in any one way. And it's what I've always wanted as well.
It's like I just read a page from my own diary. It's really kind of strange.
but yeah. just so you know. I love you, and I don't care if you're boring. :P
Not true Jer. You're definitely one of my talented friends. You have one of the most beautiful singing voices of anyone that I've ever actually met. And you have such a unique personality and tastes. You're someone hip to know and an impressive person. Personally, I think that you're all that.
On the other hand, it's nice to know that I'm not the only person who feels this way. Thanks for being hip with what I'm sayin', dudette.
Miss you!
Depressingly, identity is something you can never get by wanting it badly.
I could learn to play blues harmonica, but I would still just be me, and old black men would still have more soul than I could ever get.
Truthfully, I'd settle for just being able to wear cool hats without feeling like a tool.
Sometimes it gets to you, and other times you you something so very clever or foolish that you feel tremendously real and individuated. And in that moment you can ascend to the status of "the genuine article" -or in the pejorative: "the shit." And if you're very careful, remaining quite still and not saying too much you can hold onto that feeling of self-intrigue. Sooner or later though, you'll invariably fall back into a vaguely fuzzy falseness covering most everything you do.
The best advice I know of is to just do what you feel most comfortable doing. Sometimes that will be interesting, other times it involves watching 90's soap opera's and trying to guess the cheesy line that the actor/actress will say before they can say it, or dancing garishly to kitsch 80's music, the details are up to you.
And since any attempt to sum up that point sound like cheesy aphorisms, I'll stop pretending to have life experience.
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