(no subject)
Because Morgan said to, and because you might care, but probably wont.
He never had trouble saying hi to me because he was sure of his popularity, his status, his coolness, suaveness, whatever. But I never said hi to him at least not first anyway because well, I’m me of course and he’s he and we are most definitely not a we or friends or anything like that. But the other day I was walking down the hall, all alone like a big loser and looking at the ground at the tiles and the black, white, black black, maroon, black, white, and I was thinking about something and then I saw him walking with all of his friends all cool-like and if I hadn’t been to shy to stare at them for a moment I’m sure that I would have seen an orb of light hovering around them like they have in movies and stuff. But I just kept looking at the tiles, maroon, white, maroon, black, white, black black. Usually I am invisible. To most people anyway. I mean, some of the freshmen know me and a few sophomores I guess, but in a crowd I generally blend in. But he always notices me even when I try to hide go figure right? So he’s with his friends and I’m with mine, being that I’m all alone, and he sees me and screams “CARRRIEEEEEE” so loudly that all of his posse stop talking about the football game and stare at me for a second before realizing that I am no one and they continue their conversation and I can feel the blood rushing to my cheeks as I whisper “hey Jake” and give him an awkward wave. So that’s what happened and I was really embarrassed so I shielded my face and took a few deep breaths and proceeded to stumble over my own feet down the hallway. My heart was beating in my throat and I didn’t understand why he had this effect on me. I mean, sure he was popular and whatnot, and cute sure but we never engaged in conversation, he just always managed to say hey or shout my name or just make a long noise in my presence to get my attention or to alert other people of my existence as a human being in this messed up world.
But I went to class and continued the day as normal, you know, as if Jake hadn’t a said anything to me. I sat by myself in class, no one to my right, no one to my left, because that is where I sat on the first day of school and even though the teacher didn’t give us assigned seats, we sort of assigned ourselves seats. Kelly Walker always sat next to Tim Drake, and Ashley and Stephanie and Kayla always sat next to each other and passed notes in the back of the class where the teacher couldn’t see. And I think the teacher really could see, but he didn’t care, and I don’t care. I sat by myself. Sometimes I paid attention and sometimes I did not. You know. Sometimes it’s just hard to focus and you start thinking about other things and then you remember that you aren’t paying attention so you try to start paying attention but you’ve already missed so much that you can’t pay attention so you just have to continue not paying attention and hope that nobody notices. This was not one of those days. I was paying attention. We were reading Pride and Prejudice. I thought it was a great book. Lizzy, the bold girl, and Darcy, oh Darcy. I admired Lizzy and sometimes I told myself that I would be like her. I would question people, people like Darcy, the beautiful people who think they know everything and have the right to be ignorant and rude and whatnot, I would confront them and say, “hey, you’re wrong.” But I never did that because I’m me and not Lizzy. Elizabeth Bennett, you know. But the teacher didn’t really like the book I don’t think because he wasn’t giving Lizzy any credit for going against traditional society. And he didn’t care the Charlotte married for money and status rather than for love. And he didn’t care that Darcy was handsome and charming and irresistible and mean and cold and whatever else. He didn’t care and at first I thought he was going to make me not care, but I did care because I liked Lizzy. And I like satires.
I don’t think that you can really be happy until you can laugh at yourself. And that’s what Jane Austen was trying to say. Or something. Maybe not, I don’t know, but I think that was part of it, that she wanted to make a change in society by proving through humor that society is wrong. I don’t know, you’ve probably read it. And she was a revolutionary. Sometimes I am a revolutionary. Not really. I just like the sound of those words together. But in no way do I try to change the social situation in the world, or even in the school. There are the popular kids, who I do not talk to just because those are the rules. And then there is the next group, the middle group, they can associate with almost whoever they want because they are in the middle, although they still can’t full out associate with the popular kids, but if they wanted to ask a popular kid a question or something, I think that would be allowed. And then there are the losers. They tend to stay together as a group, knowing their position. And then there are the losers who are loners, like me. But not quite like me because I have friends for the most part, just not good friends, like I don’t go to parties on the weekends and stuff.
So after class I walked to my locker to throw some books in there before heading to my next class. And that was when I ran into Jake again. It was strange because usually I only see Jake like once a week, if that, but twice in one day? That was taking a toll on my nerves and my abilities to not make a fool out of myself again by doing something embarrassing or stupid or stuff. So I tried to hide so he wouldn’t see me, because that seemed the best way to handle the situation. I buried my nose in my thick calculus book, not realizing at the time that if he did see me I would have my nose in a calculus book. So he saw me with my nose in a calculus book. Big deal. To you maybe not, but really, trust me that it was a big deal because I felt like the biggest loser ever. And then this happened.
“Hey Carrie!” Jake gives me a little wave, a little nod, a noddish like wave.
“Hey Jake.” I blush, give him a partial smile, don’t return the nod or the wave. That’s one thing I’ve learned: you don’t return a nod with a wave, you don’t return a wave with words. You can return a wave with a nod, but mostly I’ve learned you smile and move on. But if there is an exchange of words, then there is an exchange of words and sometimes if you are both walking in opposite directions it’s hard for the exchange of words to continue unless you both stop to talk to each other, or else the conversation just drifts away until you are too far to hear each other anymore.
But we weren’t headed in opposite directions. I was stopped and now he was stopped, too. Were we about to engage in conversation? I panicked. So I threw my hand up in the air in an attempt to give him a high five, but when he just stood and stared at me blankly, making no attempt to meet my high five midway, I just gave him an air five of sorts and said, “welp see ya around!” giggled awkwardly for a few seconds and then took off in a sprint down the hallway. People jumped out of my way, giving me a clear getaway. I turned to look over my shoulder to see if Jake was still watching and in that brief moment I collided with a scrawny freshman boy. He stared at me, shocked, confused. “Sorry, sorry, really sorry!” I shouted back to him while I jumped over books and backpacks, continuing my escape from sociality.
In retrospect, that idea sucked. I mean, I could have just talked to him, you know, it wouldn’t have been that hard. But it would have been that hard, you see, because clearly I couldn’t think or talk or walk even around Jake. It didn’t use to be that way though, not always. I guess I forgot to even tell you how Jake knew my name. Because it’s sort of important. So I guess it began in third grade, our pseudo friendship. That’s when I moved to Baltimore and started going to a small Catholic private school near my house. I didn’t know anyone in this city except for Jake who lived two houses over from me and our moms talked to each other so we carpooled. That’s basically how we knew each other. Jake was nice to me even though he was the typical jock and I had established myself as the stereotypical nerd. I did the whole braces and glasses thing. You could say my awkward years started in second grade and ended never. But that’s completely beside the point. I was a nerd, geek, loser, freak, whatever. I was one dimensional. And if I tried to step out of my dimension, I was squashed back. That’s one of the reasons I’m excited for college, you know, so I can be a little more 3D and stuff. But anyway, Jake knew me as that nerd in the car, but he still always said hi to me. Even after I moved from our neighborhood into a house forty minutes from school. But by that time I was driving myself, so Jake and I wouldn’t have carpooled anyway.
But one morning I was walking with one of my quasi friends, who we will call Charla, cause that is her name and I might need to make a reference back to her. So we were walking from the parking lot up to school. And that’s when I saw Jake. He must have gotten to school early that day or something cause I never saw him on this walk. Plus, he had a free first period, so he usually came late. Not that I know or anything. It’s not like I stalk him or something so don’t think that because I didn’t, I just remember things really easily like Jake has a red backpack and his birthday is June 4th, and he played left field for our school’s baseball team and his favorite color is burnt orange. I just remember things, that’s all.
So, right, we were walking behind him. Like I could have reached out to touch him if I wanted to, really I could have, but I didn’t because that would have been weird, and even though I’m a loser, I’m not a weirdo. But he was there. And I wanted to say hi to him because, well, I like when people say hi to me, not that they usually do, but if they did I think that I would like it. So I was going to say hi. But I didn’t really want to because he might not know who I am. I’m not very memorable. So I said to Charla, “hey, Charla, do you think I should say hi to Jake because I think I should but I don’t really want to but I think it would be nice and maybe then we could be friends but then he might try to start a conversation with me and then I would have to be social and what if he doesn’t know me, or what if he’s having a bad day and he doesn’t want people to see me talking to him?” But Charla was just like “I dunno, do want you want.” I never really liked Charla that much.
So I decided to say something to him. But by the time that I had decided that we had reached the door of the building and he took off down the hall to greet his fellow football mates. Well I didn’t really mind because it was like God was just like saying “hey Carrie he doesn’t know who you are so don’t embarrass yourself.” Well, thanks, God. That’s what I thought to myself then. But it doesn’t really matter now because it wasn’t a really important moment, it was just something that happened and no one really cared.
Last year Jake was in my English class. That’s how we sort of started being friends again. I mean like he used to say hi to me usually, but after we had class together he said hi to me always, so I attribute that to us being in class together. Like one time he sat in front of me and I made some cynical comment and he turned around in his seat to give me a high five so I gave him a high five back. But after I gave him the high five I was like, “oh no, what if he was just turning around to look at me because I made a really stupid comment and his hand just happened to be in the air. Or what if his hand was just like there and I gave him a high five.” That was pretty embarrassing. The girl sitting next to me told me that he definitely wanted the high five to happen. I’m still not sure though.
I talked to my brother about it. About how boys think. He said I think too much, like I overanalyze things or something and I should just do what a want. He said that boys just do what they want, like they don’t think about it first. See, I think that’s sort of a bad idea because if you just do want you want without thinking it through it could turn out really badly, but I guess it could also turn out really well, so it just depends if you are an optimist or a pessimist. But if you are an optimist then you are an optimist and if you are a pessimist then you are a pessimist because you can’t be both clearly. Because that would make you have sort of a personality. Like what would you be if you were a little bit of both? You couldn’t be the “hey that girl is the optimist” or the “hey that girl is the pessimist.” You’d have to be some sort of “that girl is an optimistic pessimist or a pessimistic optimist or a pessimist who is sometimes optimistic or that optimist who is pessimistic when it suits her so really she is a hypocrite and she can’t be classified into one thing and so therefore we just can’t be her friend.” Stop trying to make me one thing! In this adolescent search to find ourselves, what have we really done? We have defined ourselves as this or as that just to satisfy our human desires to know who we are. And what if I want to be a nerd and be friends with a jock? Why isn’t that allowed? Why can’t I be that girl who is a nerd who is friends with a jock who also plays soccer and likes playing Rolling Stones on the guitar and likes to read and likes to watch TV and loves football and likes getting dressed up? In our attempts to be different we have all become the same. We are all trying to satisfy ourselves by calling ourselves something and we are all struggling to redefine ourselves. We’ve all become narcissistic, only concerned with who we are and disregarding who everyone else is.
I ran into Jake in the airport. He’s going to Duke to play baseball. I asked him because I say hey to him. I wasn’t sure if it was him at first but I ran to catch up to him and then we talked. It was the first time I had ever said hi to him first. And probably the last time, too. Because when he gave me a hug and said, “hey, good luck at Emerson. You’ll love it, I know. Keep in touch!” I knew that we were not going to keep in touch. I didn’t have his phone number, screen name, email address, nothing. And even if I did, I wouldn’t have ever picked up the phone just to give him a call to chat. I watched him walk down the terminal, past the Body Shop and Starbucks. His red backpack pulled tightly over his shoulders, probably holding some CDs or his iPod, or maybe even a book or Sports Illustrated or something, you know, something a guy would have in his backpack. One single tear fell from my eye and streaked my cheek with wetness. I wiped it away, embarrassed that someone might see, and I considered not even telling you that I had cried because it makes me seem like a melodramatic freak. But I had to tell you because you have to know that this was a friendship gone forever. Sure, I could call Charla up when I come home for Thanksgiving, and maybe even some of my other quasi friends. But Jake, well he was gone forever. The only person who had appreciated me despite social barriers. To him, I was Carrie, I wasn’t just that girl in our English class or that girl in the carpool. I was Carrie and all the things that I am, the nervous girl who can’t talk to boys, the nerd with the braces and glasses, the overanalyzer. And maybe I didn’t change the social barriers, maybe I wasn’t an Elizabeth Bennett or a Jane Austen, maybe I was just me, but that was revolutionary enough, to be myself in this messed up world.