Most Likely to Get Voted Off the Island

I think of myself as the person Most Likely to Get Voted Off the Island whenever I am at any social function. This is because I’m a conversational dud, and my face doesn’t give anything away either. I don’t have “a warm smile” or “kind eyes.” I’m like a one-way mirror – you know someone creepy is on the other side, but all you can see is yourself.

You would think I would compensate by doing tasks – chopping toppings for the pizzas, volunteering to be on the decorating committee, setting up the A/V equipment. But I don’t really want to do these things, and I don’t have to, so I don’t. I go off and read instead. Or, I go off intending to read, but I dick around and play little games in my head instead. The games are more interesting to me than most people are.

There was an autistic boy at the last social gathering I went to, a wedding and he was part of the family. He asked people blunt things, and only talked about what interested him (mostly airplanes). I saw him on the way to breakfast and said “good morning” but he said nothing back. He just kept walking alone in the tall grass that was wet with the morning dew.

Yellow Rose and Pie Tins

I was already running late to work when I had to stop behind the school bus that always stops to pick up the little handicapped girl. I’ve been stopped behind this bus before, and it’s always a tedious process – the bus stops, opens a big wide door, slowly lowers this ramp, one of the girl’s parents wheels her onto it, itslowly lifts her up. Long lines of cars form on either side of the street but no one dares to honk to tell them to hurry it up.

This morning as it was happening, I looked around for things to make me less bored. In a front yard a single yellow rose was growing, and aluminum pie tins were hanging over planted things, I don’t know why. The tins kind of made it look like a crazy person lived there.

All of us thought, again, how sad it was that the little girl was handicapped.

I waited as patiently as I could, but then it seemed as if the bus driver was being extravagantly leisurely, just because he or she could get away with it and nobody would dare to honk. I inched forward conspicuously, as if to say, “Let’s get this show on the road!”, the next best thing to honking, and part of me felt bad for doing this but most of me was already thinking about other things.

What do these mean?

A guy on my crowded Metro train pointed at my tote bag with all the buttons pinned to it and said, “What do all these mean?”

It had been a rough morning. I had not put on my make-up – my “face” – yet. I had sort of been glowering all morning, nursing all my petty hurts and cosmic injustices. I was not prepared to engage with anyone. Plus, again, it was a crowded train, and I felt self-conscious. So I chose the shortest answer possible.

“Musicians” was the word that came from my throat, thick with disuse.

“Classical?” he asked, even though it was clearly Björk on most of the buttons.

The guy looked kind of like David Foster Wallace, who is a writer I like. His brown eyes were genuinely curious. Why? Because he’s one of those people who “wants to know everyone’s story”? The buttons weren’t that awesome. Surely it wasn’t because I looked “hot,” sitting there with no face on yet, frowning down into my book.

“Alternative rock” I said without elaboration, and looked down again, as if he had said something harassing, ostentatiously ignoring him and shutting the door to more questions. Out of my peripheral vision I looked at the pattern of manufactured rips on his black jeans.

I hunched my shoulders stiffly, almost like I had some sort of problem. I prayed he would get off at the next stop and he did.

If I’d had some wine in me, I would have told him about the Björk exhibit I saw at MoMA in New York City with my sister, how I was glad I went but it was ultimately disappointing. I would have told him that one of the buttons was from a showing of “Pee-wee’s Big Adventure” at this cool moviehouse where they give you props and sometimes have themed menus to go along with the show; I could have recommended the place in case he’d never been there. I would have told him that one of the buttons was from my sister-in-law’s play at the Capital Fringe Festival, and another was from a Harry Potter party, for which I took an online quiz that determined I am a Hufflepuff.

I never feel “ready” to interact with anyone. I’m pacing in the wings, rehearsing my lines, fiddling with my ill-fitting costume. Sometimes the director calls me in cold, and I stand there blank as a stranger. The real show will happen sometime but not right now.

Certain topics

They tell you not to write about certain topics if you want to be a “cool” writer. Love, for instance. They tell you love is a subject for smaller minds. Love is treacly and mushy, gaudy valentines with gold-foil Cupids playing trumpets on a heart-shaped doily.

Self-pity, too. Too many people want to play a tiny violin, to share their “sob story” about that time they loved with the purest of heart but were rejected or betrayed.

Sure enough, these are the things I think about when I listen to certain music that could be cynically described as manipulative – the kind of stuff people use for movie scores, to make you cry.

I drive in my car and listen to this music, and it makes me think about the time I packed up my things and drove out to California for a boy who ultimately did not want me (except for sex), and how much I loved him, and I cry and it feels profound but I could never write about it.

–Christie Chapman 4 Life