Happy Hour

At my job's happy-hour gathering at a sports bar last night, I sat at the far end of the table with my roommate M, one of my co-workers, and her boyfriend. My co-worker, as my boss has observed before, is my complete opposite. She's very girly, very extroverted, very conversational. I have to admit that when I first met her, I was a little off-put by her "ditziness" so to speak, but over time I've grown fond of her exuberance.

I forget what we were talking about, but at some point she told me that she had been trying to figure out if I was dating XY, one of our co-workers. I don't remember my exact reaction, but it was probably some graceless blurting of "HUH?" She said she even asked her supervisor to "get the scoop," and now I'm wondering how far this rumor has traveled up the ladder.

The truth is though, it has crossed my mind about whether or not people have looked at me and XY and assumed we were something. XY and I started work at the same time, so we suffered through the first week of training together and I would say we got along pretty well right from the start. I get the feeling that people at work have started to assume that I know XY the best--when someone asked where XY was this week, my boss answered that he was on vacation, but then looked at me as if I was supposed to confirm this.

There are different ways to fall. Sometimes, you fall quickly and violently--descent into a madness that consumes your every waking moment. Sometimes you fall so slowly and gradually that when you realize what's happened, you're surprised you didn't pick up on it earlier. And sometimes, you catch yourself losing your balance, but you never truly let yourself go.

I like XY, but I don't think I like XY. When people ask the whole "what qualities do you like blah blah" conversation, I'll toss out attributes that I like, with the caveat that I don't put much stock in having criteria because I tend to break my own rules anyway. In XY's case, there are a lot of things I do like about him. He's very polite and easy to joke around with. But when he mentioned he had a girlfriend, I felt absolutely nothing.

In the end, I laughed off my surprise and had to break the news to my co-worker that no, XY and I were not dating, and that XY was already seeing someone. I almost wanted to ask her what made her jump to that conclusion, but by that point I decided I didn't need to know the answer.

Mask Ramble

I'll let you in on a secret.

I came up for the idea of EP almost seven years ago. At the time, I was a sophomore in high school with an unhealthy dose of self-loathing. I hated my personality. My introvertedness seemed like a curse in an extroverted society. I was awkward with strangers. It always took me a long time to open up to anyone. This shyness had been present all through my childhood, but what I didn't realize until later was that my subconscious attempts at hiding my fear and looking confident turned me cold. People saw the mixture of confidence and silence as chilled aloofness. There are some girls who seem shy in a harmless way. Instead, my shyness had gained a hard edge and turned into intimidation. A weapon.

Charlotte became an extension of who I was in those miserable times. Like me, she was an introvert in an extroverted world. She was cast in the shadows of bright and loud people like Nicolette and Cassie, and she didn't know how to escape from the shadows. As an analogy, I extended her lack of self-esteem to her music. She may be a genius and a prodigy, but her stage-fright prevents her from realizing this full potential.

Rory served as a foil to Charlotte, because Rory was the type of girl I always envied. Confident, charming, outspoken, witty--an extrovert who thrives from people. When Charlotte begins to masquerade as Rory's ghost, in essence she tries to mask her insecurities by pretending to be someone else who compensates for those flaws.

In a way, I tried to do the same in my own life. My best friends in high school and college were both charming girls who were more extroverted than me. Whenever I was in an awkward social situation and wanted to dig myself into a hole and disappear, I would try to imagine how they would react in the same situation.

I thought I had overcome my fears and learned how to put the extrovert mask convincingly on while I was in college. Except something that happened yesterday knocked me backwards with the realization that, deep down, I still haven't changed at all. I've been parading around like a Rory for the last four years while Charlotte is still hiding underneath.

Iris

thank goodness i was born around the age of youtube. otherwise, i'd never be able to watch live performances like this one. gives me the chills.

Fall For Your Type

I wonder why I never learned my lesson
It's feeling like it's second chance and it's the first impression
And I heard there's nothing new except for someone new
But how you supposed to find the one when anyone don't come with you
Talking to myself but I never listen
'Cause, man, it's been a while and I swear that this one's different
That's why I'mma take you anywhere you wanna go
Let you meet my friends so they can lecture me again
About how reckless I have been
And I'm slowly running out of all the time that I invested
Making all the same mistakes
And I'm just trying to correct it, and I fall

-- "Fall for Your Type" by Drake