I'm under no illusions that my voice is particularly pleasant. I cringe when I hear myself on answering machines or on video, clinging to any hope there may be that my voice doesn't actually sound like that. I sound like a child when recorded. It's really just embarrassing trying to record your voice mail message for work when every time you sound like you snuck into daddy's office and started playing with the phone.
My creative nonfiction writing class is full of annoying voices. One girl, a honey blonde, accompanies her voice with nose scrunches. Her voice is low and hollow, airy and patronizing, as if she's your kindergarten teacher and you're the silly kid who always eats the paste. Overly concerned with not offending anyone, her sing song voice creeps into a small giggle at the end of her literary criticisms and she seals it by smiling in such a way that her face collapses like an accordion. Her lips contort into a rosebud smile, pushing her nose up, creating little crinkles along the bridge. For some inexplicable reason, she closes her eyes. Her eyes are not being squished closed by a big smile, she voluntarily closes them, perhaps having once seen the expression she makes in a mirror, and hoping to never catch a glimpse of it again.
My assessment of another girl may be biased. Whenever we have a workshop, collaboratively critiquing someone's essay as a class, most people try to point out things they liked, plot points that were confusing, or areas that need more clarification, only seldom adding in critiques of grammar. But not this girl. In her cynical, sarcastic drone, her only effort at class participation is to tell someone that their sentences were too long, or there were too many commas. This all changed when she was the one being critiqued. I never noticed her voice to be particularly annoying, but probably because she rarely talked. Our teacher has us read our essay aloud before it's discussed, and she, regrettably, started off with an insufferable monotone. There are few things worse than a monotone voice. One of them, is someone who talks, or reads, too slowly. We have 50 minutes to discuss two essays. She took up around 10 minutes reading two and a half single spaced pages. The slow rhythm accented a little problem with inflection. Every sentence had the slightest upward inflection. Not enough to form a question but just enough for me to want to stuff her thick black glasses down her throat.
Our final (shall we say intriguing..?) voice comes from a chubby, pale, geek who wears a dog collar. No idea why. Can you ask someone a question like that? "What's up with the dog collar?" I just don't know. His voice isn't annoying, because he sounds like Elmer Fudd, who is just a lovable guy, despite his murderous nature. But it's hard to take Dog Collar Boy seriously when he means "brutally" and it comes out "bootally." It's also really difficult to understand someone with a speech impediment reading out loud. Everything is jumbled together, there is no such thing as an "R" in the world of Dog Collar Boy. His wishy washy ways are similar to Batista, from one of my favorite shows, Dexter, which I watch with Travis. Travis constantly makes fun of Batista, and while Dog Collar Boy talks, all I can imagine is Travis impersonating him, repeating everything he says in an exaggerated way. I think my version of hell will be something similar, hearing myself on video over and over for all time.
Thursday, November 12, 2009
Monday, November 9, 2009
Monday, November 2, 2009
Ulterior Motives and the Folly of Trust
I understand that a good number of guys randomly strike up random conversations with girls because they think they're pretty and they want to go out, hang out, or just get laid. It's just annoying when a guy pretends to be cool: talks to you, seems nice, normal and not a pervert. Then he asks you to lunch and a little flag goes off. He doesn't know me enough to want to hang out because we're friends. So do I awkwardly bring up that I'm seeing someone? Do I go out to lunch and only after he makes a move, do I even more awkwardly bring it up? Or do I get over myself and not assume he wants to eventually get me naked? In my most recent run in with this situation I decided to bring it up then and there on facebook chat. I said that I wasn't sure if it mattered but that I was seeing someone so lunch wouldn't really turn into anything. And with those simple, slightly presumptuous words he stopped talking to me. I don't mean, we finished that conversation and I haven't talked to him since. I mean that those were the last words in our chat box. Period.
Normally if a guy abruptly cuts off the conversation, I don't blame it on what I said, but instead the idea that he's probably busy. If he cuts off the conversation after something like that, what am I supposed to think? Does the fact that I just said something important really change the likelihood of him suddenly becoming busy and moving away from the computer? I don't think it does, but how am I supposed to not think that influenced his disappearance at all? Is my current feeling of hate unfounded? Am I really reading into it too much?
Unfortunately, I also read things into the innocent happenings of everyday life. After class I sat on a bench to wait for the bus. I was focused on getting to the bubblegum center of my Cherry Blow Pop, but I had noticed out of the corner of my little eye that I had sat on a bench that was next to another occupied bench. A dwarfish looking guy sat there, glasses, wavy brown hair, and acne scars on his pastey skin. I sat, minding my own business, and he looked over at me.
"Is it good?" he motioned with his eyes to my Blow Pop.
"Yeah... it's Cherry" I hoped this was all he had to say.
"I always preferred Green Apple myself" he continued to ask me if I had any classes left and since I didn't, where I was headed. When I responded that I was going home, he asked where I lived, which I find to be an inappropriate question to ask a stranger at the bus stop. I continued the chit chat until we got on the bus, when I sat one person away from him. He felt the need to tell me his name was Daniel, I of course responded with my name and when he left I said it was nice talking to him, which wasn't completely untrue. He told me to enjoy my lollipop.
Maybe it's the way he started his conversation observing that I was sucking on a hard candy on a stick but at first I though "Oh crap. How is this conversation going to turn insanely bizarre very quickly? Am I going to have to maneuver through painful attempts at flirting?" As he talked more I thought he might be gay, simply because of his voice and mannerisms, but then he explained how he wouldn't be able to swing dance with a guy as his partner, so that hypothesis was shot. He was perfectly nice and friendly but I was constantly waiting for an ulterior motive. What does he want? Is he wondering if I have another lollipop? Is it shallow of me for assuming the chubby kid is only talking to me for candy?
I used to think that I felt so out of place in Indiana because I'm originally from Massachusetts, where random acts of kindness and social interactions are not met with the same attitude as they are in Middle America. When I say random act of kindness and the like, I mean from strangers; who doesn't love when someone they know does something sweet? I don't know if I can always blame my aversion for friendly strangers on my Masshole upbringing. Am I just not a trusting person? Probably. I equate being trusting with being stupid. The summer after my senior year, my dad had a little known man named Walter from Peru come live with us so he could help my dad with his photography business. It was disastrously unsuccessful, he almost burned the house down, let our dog out without his leash to run and frolic in the street, and was just offensive and an idiot. I'm going to have to explain Walter later, probably the story of how he called my mom fat and I was kicked under the table when I went off at him. If that's not a ringing endorsement to look at everyone with a suspicious eye, then no such thing exists.
Do guys randomly Facebook friend girls they don't know for no reason? Maybe, but I'm not going to just assume that's so. Does every guy who strikes up a conversation while he's bored and waiting for the bus want something? I doubt it, but the thought can still cross my mind. I don't think keeping people at a distance for a while is going to be my downfall, but bringing people in too quickly definitely can be. And a woman should always err on the side of caution with suspicious men.
Normally if a guy abruptly cuts off the conversation, I don't blame it on what I said, but instead the idea that he's probably busy. If he cuts off the conversation after something like that, what am I supposed to think? Does the fact that I just said something important really change the likelihood of him suddenly becoming busy and moving away from the computer? I don't think it does, but how am I supposed to not think that influenced his disappearance at all? Is my current feeling of hate unfounded? Am I really reading into it too much?
Unfortunately, I also read things into the innocent happenings of everyday life. After class I sat on a bench to wait for the bus. I was focused on getting to the bubblegum center of my Cherry Blow Pop, but I had noticed out of the corner of my little eye that I had sat on a bench that was next to another occupied bench. A dwarfish looking guy sat there, glasses, wavy brown hair, and acne scars on his pastey skin. I sat, minding my own business, and he looked over at me.
"Is it good?" he motioned with his eyes to my Blow Pop.
"Yeah... it's Cherry" I hoped this was all he had to say.
"I always preferred Green Apple myself" he continued to ask me if I had any classes left and since I didn't, where I was headed. When I responded that I was going home, he asked where I lived, which I find to be an inappropriate question to ask a stranger at the bus stop. I continued the chit chat until we got on the bus, when I sat one person away from him. He felt the need to tell me his name was Daniel, I of course responded with my name and when he left I said it was nice talking to him, which wasn't completely untrue. He told me to enjoy my lollipop.
Maybe it's the way he started his conversation observing that I was sucking on a hard candy on a stick but at first I though "Oh crap. How is this conversation going to turn insanely bizarre very quickly? Am I going to have to maneuver through painful attempts at flirting?" As he talked more I thought he might be gay, simply because of his voice and mannerisms, but then he explained how he wouldn't be able to swing dance with a guy as his partner, so that hypothesis was shot. He was perfectly nice and friendly but I was constantly waiting for an ulterior motive. What does he want? Is he wondering if I have another lollipop? Is it shallow of me for assuming the chubby kid is only talking to me for candy?
I used to think that I felt so out of place in Indiana because I'm originally from Massachusetts, where random acts of kindness and social interactions are not met with the same attitude as they are in Middle America. When I say random act of kindness and the like, I mean from strangers; who doesn't love when someone they know does something sweet? I don't know if I can always blame my aversion for friendly strangers on my Masshole upbringing. Am I just not a trusting person? Probably. I equate being trusting with being stupid. The summer after my senior year, my dad had a little known man named Walter from Peru come live with us so he could help my dad with his photography business. It was disastrously unsuccessful, he almost burned the house down, let our dog out without his leash to run and frolic in the street, and was just offensive and an idiot. I'm going to have to explain Walter later, probably the story of how he called my mom fat and I was kicked under the table when I went off at him. If that's not a ringing endorsement to look at everyone with a suspicious eye, then no such thing exists.
Do guys randomly Facebook friend girls they don't know for no reason? Maybe, but I'm not going to just assume that's so. Does every guy who strikes up a conversation while he's bored and waiting for the bus want something? I doubt it, but the thought can still cross my mind. I don't think keeping people at a distance for a while is going to be my downfall, but bringing people in too quickly definitely can be. And a woman should always err on the side of caution with suspicious men.
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