I Have Enough Friends

I just sat down to eat at Burnham's Burgers for my lunch today.  I was alone but quite happy to watch YouTube as I ate my egg mushroom burger.  As I am munching on my food,  I see someone I know who is alone as well.  We have known each other a long time.  We exchanged pleasantries and he sat down away from me with his back turned.  When I finished I said goodbye and he said goodbye and that was  it.
I reflected as I walked away,  shuffling with fake confidence on my still improving right knee.  What was I to that person? What was that person to myself?  Friends? Friends would sit down and eat together. We would enquire into each other's lives.  We would talk about minutiae, or deep thoughts. I felt no such compulsion to be at the same table in the same way he felt no desire to share with me his innermost secrets.

But we are not enemies.  At least,  I don't think we are.  I know he is part of a group of people who regard me with emotions ranging from disdain to indifference.  Bit he has always been cordial and polite.  I have never heard of him saying a bad word to anyone,  much less about me.  He doesn't roll like that.

So what exactly are we to each  other?  Colleagues?  The TESOL Community is now far too large to be friends just because you're both foreigners in a strange land trying to do an unappreciated job. Acquaintances? We have both been part of sports leagues and dramatic events.  And yet, we never hung out.

We are Facebook friends,  that number you can either  choose to let define you or not.  People you have known your whole life,  or people you met at a bar last night are giving the same station.  Yes,  you can partition your friend groups in Facebook.  No,  I don't do that.  Who has the time and the inclination to breakdown their association?

And yet.  What am I to that guy? Probably nothing important. If I was,  I reason,  he would try to get to know me better.  The fact he hasn't tells me he has no pressing desire or need.  He has enough friends.  Good for him.

If you asked a younger version if me if you could have a finite number of friends,  he would have scrunched up his face and snuffed the suddenly confusing air. Too many friends,  are you kidding me? Nowadays,  I can say I have enough friends.

I am confident with my picks.  I have multiple circles that are interwoven and autonomous.  I have different interests represented.  I have respect and love and joy and connection.  I can lose touch without fear of losing friendship.  I have colleagyes and Acquaintances as well.  But really,  I don't worry about being just another Facebook friend in the crowd.

I have enough friends.

A Very Public Apology For being Myself

So, look, here's the thing. You know me. You know a version of me. Everyone has a version of me in their group of social interaction, be it in  the workplace or in the classroom or in your actual free time. I am that guy people say is the 'the life of the party' while raising their eyebrows. Possibly in a manner suggesting said title is really the whole joke.

I never thought it was a joke, being a popular , enjoyed person. I took it in a deadly serious manner. I hate anyone not liking me. For mem that is a throwback to preteen and teen me, a shy, uncomfortable character that slunk in the shadows. I would throttle that version of me if I could, stomp on his head until I heard his teeth chip and break. I would set him on fire. I push myself on so many ocassions to talk to strangers, to listen to others talk about things that are not interesting or listen to genuinely unpleasant or worse, boring people. I needed their approval so much I gave mine up completely. Love me, my persona screams, if only because of how good a job I am presenting of loving you.

And that situation developed. People threw out terms like 'King' or Mayor' of Daegu. Honorifics which are truly horrific. And I lapped it up. I pretended to not notice the half smirks guileful people would throw at each other. I valued the love too much. I would wave a strangers when they waved at me, forgetting that we had already met previously and in their minds at least, I was  an acquaintance, a friend. I played a  part to perfection.

So now I find myself seeing my actions. And I loathe myself. I am stuck with empty vessels as acquaintance, unable to distinguish the people who are truly my friends and who is just playing along wiht the game started in my head and now played by everyone so much better. My confidence is paper thin, my skin less so. My ego is stretched wide like a balloon and needs only one acute observation to pop me into nothing. My every action is now scrutinised by my id , my super ego, my fake ego and by a committee of sub egos who all have a turn clamouring for attention.

And now I have so many ways t express myself to my new found lifelong friends. Hello, Facebook. Hello, Blogger. Sometimes they say hello back. I now have spent so much time on my friends. I have invested in them.; Surely it is time for them to invest in me. Surely they will all want to know about my day. Careful though, I better make it funny. People like my posts. I cream myself at the pleasure of seeing likes on a post increase over time. Of being witty and it being recognised. Not for the elctronic media the world of half smirks and rolling eyes. Here, it can be taken anyway I desire. Here, I am an urbane G-d.

And then I hurt myself. And it was a while ago. And I am down about it. I don't really feel like making a joke anymore. I feel lke being honest about my feelings. I feel like saying I feel awful, that my knee is punding acid into my foot. That I cannot stand up and i am afraid I will never do it properly again. That I may not run or jump or climb a tree again. These fears cloud my mind and blur my vision with tears of irreparable damage in potentia.

And I write these things not because I want the likes anymore but because I want to be heard. Because I want to be respected. because I want to be liked. Suddenly it is not the substance of the matetr but the matter which created the substance that needs appreciation. Because honestly right now, I feel no appreciation.

And no one cares. Not really. Not in the all consuming way I want them to care. Becasue that's insane. No one can care for you like a lovesick perfectly obedient, individual, clever, carefree, wise, sagacious, witty, fun way golem. They can send you commiserations but they re long distanced, weak by the time of arrival at your soul. They can visit you but you know they will go away again. You know it and they know it. It is part of the tacit arrangement.

All my friends have failed my ideal. And that is because my ideal is fractured, through decades of feverish study as to what is necessary to be popular, to being wanted. To having that transform into a ghoulish need to impress but never realizing the other half of the equation. To be impressive. And so, the reality comes to pass that I reach out to my friends in a way they find cloying, irritating, or worse, boring.

My apology is this. I am sorry for failing my friends in the hour of my greatest need. I shall, from here on in, not tell you a single thing about my day being terrible until it is something you ask for. I will not talk about things that upset me in my life. I shall not venture opinion on source material until it is asked for. I shall not ask for help in any way physical, mental, spiritual or emotional because it is clear you would not ask the same of me, even though I would have given it gladly. By repressing myself, maybe I can stop the microIDs, control my personality and make it a human being once more. Maybe I can find out what I want to listen to, to care about, to appreciated. And then I can gain the respect I deserve.



See, old me would have thrown a question at the end right here saying something like, Does any of this make any sense? I think new me would ask the same question.



Does any of this make sense?