So how do you meet people? I've tried potted flowers - that got me invited to a dinner I ended up making and quaint hellos once a month. I've tried asking people out to dinner while dancing (that one really backfired). I've tried talking to girls at the bus stop - they seem to suddenly notice that the only other guy around was their long-lost 7th-grade classmate. I've tried going to collegate girls soccer games, but instead of being surrounded by 18-20-year olds, I found myself next to Scotty McMiddle-Age-with-three-kids-and-a-bald-spot, and also some 5th-grade soccer-tournament. I started just smiling at any girl that walked by. Then I just wanted friends, so I started smiling at guys, but after a couple of bad reactions, I realized that wasn't a good idea for a heterosexual like myself. I've tried Intervarsity but was met by Spongebob theme nights and conversations with middle-aged group leaders or newlyweds. I've tried to look smart reading Wordsworth out in the open air - that attracts wildly emotional smokers (I really just assumed she was wildly emotional, but she definately was a smoker, and that's strike one, two, and three). I thought I might meet somebody at the athletic center, but I look skinny where I'm supposed to look "ripped" and the only place that pushes through my shirt is my stomach, so I can't imagine the people that live at the gymn wanting to befriend me while I have trouble benching 95 lbs and wander around the weight room trying to figure out what each machine really does. Tonight I decided to see what happens with a two front war: I went to this coffee shop that seems ridiculously trendy and ordered crepes that were a disgusting variant of tart, and some fancy chai while listening to the group beside me play Rook (if you don't know what that is, don't feel bad, I only know it's more complicated than the first three Apollo missions and the sort of card game that you play in small towns instead of getting plastered). Then I walked around downtown for a while, trying to figure out where everybody goes on a Saturday night, and I just ended up walking into this bar that sometimes has live "bluegrass" country-swing and a nice dance floor, so I slid into a bar stool, not sure what to do. The bartender mechanically came over to me, and so I asked her what kind of beers she had. "On tap?" she said. Mentally I shrugged, but my head seemed to nod, and she was listing off things that really didn't sound familiar at all, and the only ones I recognized before she came to the Budwisers and Miller Lites was Kokanee, which I knew I didn't like. I had greenhorn tatooed on my forehead, and this new group of people came in, so after asking what kind of bottled beers (why was I asking about beer when I haven't found one I like, I don't know) she had, I told her to come back to me later, like I was in a restaurant and I "just need another minute". After another thirty seconds, the gathering feelings of stupidity that had been pooling in my toes back at the coffee shop finally had reached my frontal lobe, and I nervously rose and walked out. So I thought my night was over, a seven-dollar and twenty cent lesson in how not to meet a soul. Walking toward my car, a lovely silhouette was crossing the street not far from me, and being out west, she was in some hick jeans and a tank-top that could have been any college-girl's outfit (well, not any girl), but as she came closer, she was mid-thirties, but what happens? She smiles and says hi to me. I responded in kind as I passed her, keenly aware that this woman firstly was just being polite and secondly was in high school while I was learning to walk. Besides, my glass ceiling right now is 30, something that can be revised under special circumstances (like love or banjo lessons), and as Bob said when I got home, if I had met anyone, they would have been the "disreputable kind." So here's a follow-up question to my opening line: What do you order at a bar when you're not really wanting to drink and yet you're not wanting to look like... well, you can picture me at a bar, so just fill in whatever word you think best fits the situation. I really hope the rest of you are finding some sort of friendship that satisfies your social needs and wants, because this whole finding friends thing is harder than anything else. I know, you're thinking, "Steve means 'special' friend, and we know he is just a 'good friend'", but I'm serious about just wanting friends. No offense to you guys (if you didn't take offense, don't reread this just to figure out what should have been offensive, because you might read the word "silhouette" again and then I'll be in trouble with someone), you're great friends, friends I miss dearly (unless this is my brother, who is only bound to me by DNA), but friends who aren't physically present. So as your last show of friendship, tell me how I can make people like me again (or for the first time, depending if your last name starts with Kurb). Man, this whole blog is just a bunch of parentheses (and "overused" quotation marks). This must be what my professor meant by poor writing style. Well, she didn't really say that.
Oh, good story now. I was at the girl's soccer game last night and got to see a girl break her nose on another girl's skull! It was seriously ten yards in front of me, and I heard the crack! Blood was gushing out of her nose, and I was freaked out because I thought they just went head to head, but nope, just a broken nose. And we lost, so it was crap for everyone, but way crazy to watch. Yeah, there's that poor writing style again. So who's going to Homecoming (our first "real" Homecoming)? I'm an idiot. I don't think this is exactly what Gabe meant. But I don't have a pregnant wife (again, no offense Gabe, but WHEEEW!) or cool church job... even minus the cool and church part, and nothing running through my mind but really depressing yet beautiful Italian poetry by Giacomo Leopardi. Man, I'm even a disappointment on blogger. I thought it was just a resume thing. You know what would help? If you blogged. Nope, I'm pretty sure it would. Hope you guys all have new friends or new spouses or new offspring, something.