There's Nothing Time Hasn't Touched, Is It Really Him Or The Loss Of My Innocence, I've Been Missing So Much
--"Strawberry Wine", Deana Carter
I received an e-vite from an old high school classmate of mine for a birthday party. It's probably just a mass e-mail sent to everyone on his mailing list since, by the look of things, he sent over one hundred seventy invitations, but it still feels weird to get an invitation at all. Before recently (and the advent of Facebook) I hadn't heard from the guy since the aforementioned high school days. Say what you will about social networking sites but they do manage to reunite one with people you never thought you'd be reunited with. I only have to look to my own life to see that. The fact that people like Jina and Brandy can hunt my ass down when the last time I saw them was the better part of the 90's only serves to reinforce the fact that as much as you try to lose yourself from people, there's always a manner in which they can track you down. That's great when you it's rather cool to have people pop back into your life, but what about those people that you're not jazzed about seeing or not jazzed about confronting again?
I don't know if I want to go to this party at the end of the month. It's great to keep abreast of somebody that I did time with during my stay at La Salle. It's interesting to see what he has been up to, but I have to draw the line at social functions. I'm assuming he's still a great person since he was always one of the more sincere classmates I had at school. I'm even assuming that the invitation was freely and intentionally sent. Yet there is not one part of me that would relish seeing him again. The truth of the matter is talking to him and hearing what he's done with his life would remind me that I've put a lot of life behind me since we last talked. It's the same reason I've managed to avoid my ten year high school reunion and probably am planning to avoid my twentieth. It isn't because I'm not curious to see everyone in person again, but seeing them in person would be a visual reminder that I'm not the Jenny Lewis-crushing, Wizard-watching, Cure-listening, nerd that I was in high school.
With some people I could go years without seeing and still not feel old when I do see them. I see my brother maybe once a year for a couple of days. When we hang out, though, it's like we pick up where we left. We treat each other as we've always treated each other. Or if and when Carly and I ever decide to contact one another again; it'll been almost eighteen months since I hung out with her. Yet I know as soon as one person calls the other we'll chat and make plans to catch up as if it's only been a week or so. Hell, I went nine years without seeing Breanne and it didn't feel too weird to see her again. There are certain people who don't stick out as red flags to my own mortality. The common thread between them all? They don't insist on dwelling on the past every time I talk to them.
I've always said I'd rather somebody be angry, sad, or indifferent to me than be annoying. That still holds true.
One of the most annoying things a person can do is rehash something that happened twenty years ago (that's what blogs are for). I'd even go so far as to say I strongly abhor when people asked me what I did last year and sometimes last month. The only reason they do it is because they're dying to talk about all the exciting and wondrous places they went last year, or to accurately describe the magnificence of all the people they met in the last year. If I hate talking about each and everything I did last year, I couldn't imagine the torture trying to encapsulate what my life has been like since 1993 when I graduated high school. The whole "what have you been doing since we last saw each other" conversation falls under the umbrella of small talk and I don't like doing small talk. It serves no practical purpose for me. I have no vested interest in how you're life's gone for better or for worse. The only people I care about (besides knowing who they are) know how to curtail the urge to grill me about each and every day I've spent alive as well as stick to the key points about their own life. Yes, I like hearing an amusing anecdote, but it has to be just that--amusing and just an anecdote. There's no call for trying to catch me up on everything and, for chrissakes, not every story you tell is all that interesting. There's no such thing as somebody who has lived a charmed and exciting life every step of the way. It's just like my aversion to saying hello and good-bye to people; all it does is get in the way of arriving at your point. Dress it up if you like, build suspense, and pace it all you want--but if you're going to tell me a story, make sure the story is worth the telling.
And the fact it's a birthday party is doubly worse. Seeing someone revel in the fact they're getting older confuses me. It's addling. Birthdays for me have always been contemplative. Even when I'm celebrating mine with other people I prefer it to be a more somber and serious affair. It's a big deal when I get older; frivolity and birthdays haven't gone hand-in-hand in almost thirteen years for me. Ever since I turned twenty I stopped looking forward to birthdays. As I told Jina at the time, the reason for that falls under my illogical way of thinking.
We celebrate milestones. We celebrate one month, one year, five years, ten years, even thirteen. In some cultures fifteen and sixteen are celebrated. Then, of course, the milestones of eighteen and twenty-one are celebrated. How many of them have names, though? Not many. It goes a day, a month, a year, a decade, a century maybe.
When I turned twenty I realized that's the last age before a century that has a term for it. I turned a score on that day. I'd already had my first day, my first year, and my first decade on this earth celebrated. As soon as October 11th rolled around, I knew all that was left for me to look forward to was hitting a century. There simply was nothing else that had a name to celebrate.
I don't want to go see him.
I don't want to talk to him about high school.
I don't want to facetiously wish him a happy birthday.
Birthdays are never happy. Getting old is not a good thing. Seeing people who remind you about the good 'ole times is not my idea of fun.
I'd rather surround myself with people who only narrowly focus what they're doing now; who don't ask what I've been up to or what I have in the works. I'd rather have conversations about entertainment, pop culture, or sports rather than what it all means, why things have to happen, or what my beliefs are (again, topics best reserved for blogs or journals). I'd rather have conversations about what we're going to do for fun rather than what great fun we once had.
I'd rather delude myself into thinking there's more of that high school kid still in me than isn't and that ain't going to happen as soon as I walk into that birthday party. Walking into there would be like admitting that kid died a long time ago. Walking into there would really be the end of my youth once and for all.
Fuck that.
Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers
I received an e-vite from an old high school classmate of mine for a birthday party. It's probably just a mass e-mail sent to everyone on his mailing list since, by the look of things, he sent over one hundred seventy invitations, but it still feels weird to get an invitation at all. Before recently (and the advent of Facebook) I hadn't heard from the guy since the aforementioned high school days. Say what you will about social networking sites but they do manage to reunite one with people you never thought you'd be reunited with. I only have to look to my own life to see that. The fact that people like Jina and Brandy can hunt my ass down when the last time I saw them was the better part of the 90's only serves to reinforce the fact that as much as you try to lose yourself from people, there's always a manner in which they can track you down. That's great when you it's rather cool to have people pop back into your life, but what about those people that you're not jazzed about seeing or not jazzed about confronting again?I don't know if I want to go to this party at the end of the month. It's great to keep abreast of somebody that I did time with during my stay at La Salle. It's interesting to see what he has been up to, but I have to draw the line at social functions. I'm assuming he's still a great person since he was always one of the more sincere classmates I had at school. I'm even assuming that the invitation was freely and intentionally sent. Yet there is not one part of me that would relish seeing him again. The truth of the matter is talking to him and hearing what he's done with his life would remind me that I've put a lot of life behind me since we last talked. It's the same reason I've managed to avoid my ten year high school reunion and probably am planning to avoid my twentieth. It isn't because I'm not curious to see everyone in person again, but seeing them in person would be a visual reminder that I'm not the Jenny Lewis-crushing, Wizard-watching, Cure-listening, nerd that I was in high school.
With some people I could go years without seeing and still not feel old when I do see them. I see my brother maybe once a year for a couple of days. When we hang out, though, it's like we pick up where we left. We treat each other as we've always treated each other. Or if and when Carly and I ever decide to contact one another again; it'll been almost eighteen months since I hung out with her. Yet I know as soon as one person calls the other we'll chat and make plans to catch up as if it's only been a week or so. Hell, I went nine years without seeing Breanne and it didn't feel too weird to see her again. There are certain people who don't stick out as red flags to my own mortality. The common thread between them all? They don't insist on dwelling on the past every time I talk to them.
I've always said I'd rather somebody be angry, sad, or indifferent to me than be annoying. That still holds true.
One of the most annoying things a person can do is rehash something that happened twenty years ago (that's what blogs are for). I'd even go so far as to say I strongly abhor when people asked me what I did last year and sometimes last month. The only reason they do it is because they're dying to talk about all the exciting and wondrous places they went last year, or to accurately describe the magnificence of all the people they met in the last year. If I hate talking about each and everything I did last year, I couldn't imagine the torture trying to encapsulate what my life has been like since 1993 when I graduated high school. The whole "what have you been doing since we last saw each other" conversation falls under the umbrella of small talk and I don't like doing small talk. It serves no practical purpose for me. I have no vested interest in how you're life's gone for better or for worse. The only people I care about (besides knowing who they are) know how to curtail the urge to grill me about each and every day I've spent alive as well as stick to the key points about their own life. Yes, I like hearing an amusing anecdote, but it has to be just that--amusing and just an anecdote. There's no call for trying to catch me up on everything and, for chrissakes, not every story you tell is all that interesting. There's no such thing as somebody who has lived a charmed and exciting life every step of the way. It's just like my aversion to saying hello and good-bye to people; all it does is get in the way of arriving at your point. Dress it up if you like, build suspense, and pace it all you want--but if you're going to tell me a story, make sure the story is worth the telling.
And the fact it's a birthday party is doubly worse. Seeing someone revel in the fact they're getting older confuses me. It's addling. Birthdays for me have always been contemplative. Even when I'm celebrating mine with other people I prefer it to be a more somber and serious affair. It's a big deal when I get older; frivolity and birthdays haven't gone hand-in-hand in almost thirteen years for me. Ever since I turned twenty I stopped looking forward to birthdays. As I told Jina at the time, the reason for that falls under my illogical way of thinking.
We celebrate milestones. We celebrate one month, one year, five years, ten years, even thirteen. In some cultures fifteen and sixteen are celebrated. Then, of course, the milestones of eighteen and twenty-one are celebrated. How many of them have names, though? Not many. It goes a day, a month, a year, a decade, a century maybe.
When I turned twenty I realized that's the last age before a century that has a term for it. I turned a score on that day. I'd already had my first day, my first year, and my first decade on this earth celebrated. As soon as October 11th rolled around, I knew all that was left for me to look forward to was hitting a century. There simply was nothing else that had a name to celebrate.
I don't want to go see him.
I don't want to talk to him about high school.
I don't want to facetiously wish him a happy birthday.
Birthdays are never happy. Getting old is not a good thing. Seeing people who remind you about the good 'ole times is not my idea of fun.
I'd rather surround myself with people who only narrowly focus what they're doing now; who don't ask what I've been up to or what I have in the works. I'd rather have conversations about entertainment, pop culture, or sports rather than what it all means, why things have to happen, or what my beliefs are (again, topics best reserved for blogs or journals). I'd rather have conversations about what we're going to do for fun rather than what great fun we once had.
I'd rather delude myself into thinking there's more of that high school kid still in me than isn't and that ain't going to happen as soon as I walk into that birthday party. Walking into there would be like admitting that kid died a long time ago. Walking into there would really be the end of my youth once and for all.
Fuck that.
Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers
Labels: Birthdays, Change, Deana Carter, high school, mortality
posted by mojo shivers @ 2:20 AM
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