Oh, people!
PEOPLE!!
So I’m at The Beanhouse — of course, because everything unsettling happens there — minding my own damn barista business. Several feet in front of me, using three tables they have pushed together, huddles this group of flighty, twenty-something, first-year law students who have basically moved into The Beanhouse since September, taking advantage of the double-edged sword that is our free wireless. They hijack these tables for their impressive bank of computers, purchase the small cups of coffee they will nurse for the next 6 hours, and then, oh! then, they really get down to work. They blab and blab and blab. They lollygag. They slouch. They watch YouTube. They throw wads of paper at each other. They abandon their laptops for long stretches of time to go … lollygag elsewhere, I guess. But they always come back because, after all, they’re first-year law students and they haven’t gotten to the really important work yet.
Like making paper airplanes.
They’re all kind of annoying, but there’s something endearing and pathetic about their annoyingness. I guess I look on them with big sisterly affection. I mean, I’ve been there, in those shoes, not as a law student, but as a college student, where YOU are the whole world, where study groups are a social event having nothing whatsoever to do with studying, where your behavior is something to make a 9-year-old proud. I remember being that person. Sometimes, I am still that person, but with age comes, blessedly, a wee more self-control. These guys are all probably, oh, mid-twenties or so. Most of them are probably gay, just like 99% of Beanhouse customers and they just laze and flop around, acting like big, ol’ clumsy puppy dogs. Whatever the next impulse is, they do it.
Like making paper airplanes.
So, I’m minding my own damn barista business, as I said, when this little 3×5 card airplane comes swooping down in front of me. I glance up and one of the law students — let’s call him B — is looking at me. Grabbing the plane, I loft it back, laughing kinda absentmindedly, oh, hahaha. Silly boy. Reminds me of my grade school drama students. That kind of thing. Several seconds later, it swoops in front of me again. I’m busy at that moment, but I glance down and notice some very small writing on it this time. I take another quick glance, but with my nearsightedness, it takes several peeks for me to realize just what the darn thing says.
Here is the actual darn thing:
Uhm, whhhhhat???
My face instantly gets hot.
And you knnnnow … one thing I really wish I could control about my body is that damn blushing reflex. It shows up and gives a girl grief at the worst possible moments. And, frankly, that’s pretty much its only purpose, as far as I can tell: To out you and make matters worse. It’s not like it protects you from predators or anything, like a turtle’s bony shell or a chameleon’s mutable skin. It just makes you hot and bothered and the butt of comments from various purveyors of the obvious like, “Wow. Your face is riilllllyrillllllly red.”
Really?? You mean, like, this feeling that, like, my entire head is a bonfire means my face is red, too??? I am gobsmacked.
I’m sorry. I utterly disagree with God on this whole red-faced deal.
Okay. Hm. Where was I? As an aside here, it might be useful to know I drank sangria last night and I’ve never had sangria before and now it seems that I probably shouldn’t drink sangria. Just generally. I’m very fuzzy today. To prove my point, when I first typed “fuzzy today,” it came out “guzzy todday.”
Anyhoo …
Back to the airplane and my raging facial conflagration.
My face is burning, we’ve established, and while I’m moving about, doing my job, I feel frozen by the sheer ridiculousness of the whole thing. I am totally silent. I DO NOT KNOW what to say. He is slouched there with all his friends, head down now. My mind is swirling:
Is he kidding? He must be kidding. First of all, I’m married. He knows I’m married, right? I mean, MB is here all the time. He must have seen him. Right?? Second, dude, you’re like, 25. You seem like a kid to me. Do you think I’m in your age group? Okay. I look younger than my age, but not THAT young. Okay. This is now seriously weird because neither of us is saying ANYTHING. Gah. Third ….. dude, you actually decided — as an adult now — to throw a girl a paper airplane with “yes” and “no” boxes to ask her out on a date??? What — are you 12?? Fourth, did u really write “u”?? FIFTH, uhm, aren’t you GAAAAY??
I’m a robot now, doing my job. He’s a robot now, pretending to study. I am talking with people and have no idea what I’m saying. I can see him out of the corner of my eye, pointedly NOT looking at me. There’s now a strange electric current named “horrible” connecting us together.
Look. I am not in junior high. I am an adult. Mostly. I am NOT putting a checkmark in the “no” box and swooping a paper airplane back to where you’re sitting with your friends. If you’re actually serious, I think that would be humiliating to you. I mean, it’s not like you could shrug it off and pretend that that isn’t a paper airplane swooping towards you, right? A paper airplane heartlessly checkmarked “no.” Your friends have clearly witnessed the whole hideous hoopla and, I assume, would want to know what your little airplane said.
And if you’re joking, well, may I speak for all women here for a moment? Women generally don’t like it when you pretend to ask them out, when you do it as a joke. Women might actually think it’s a little hurtful to be the butt of some romantic dare or caper or hijinks. So, dude, if you aren’t serious and I swoop the “no” airplane back to you while you laugh and laugh because I took you seriously, that would be a little humiliating to me.
So I do …. nothing.
Moments later, a co-worker meanders by. Before I have a chance to stop him, he reads the airplane and chuckles, saying rather loudly, “So Tracey, are you gonna go out with B?”
Here comes that burning ….
Co-worker stares at me. B’s friends giggle. This is now officially the dumbest thing ever — and how, exactly, did I end up involved when I’d been carefully minding my own business? Knee-jerk, I decide B is kidding, and so I reply, rather loudly — but with a smile and my can’t-miss “good humor”:
“Oh ….. well, I’m sure that B knows I’m married.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I see him slouch even lower. Did his cheeks just redden? Ah, my can’t-miss good humor working its magic again. He lingers for another hour or so and then slinks out the other door. He usually says a big goodbye. He leaves without a word.
Ugh. Ugh. UGH.
Oh, dude! What am I supposed to do now??
Wow.
I’m sure he thought that was quite cute. Didn’t at all work out the way he was anticipating, obviously.
That is so hilarious!!! That note is killing me!
//I am NOT putting a checkmark in the “no†box and swooping a paper airplane back to where you’re sitting with your friends. //
hahahahaha Tracey – what a funny (and awful – due to the facial conflagration) experience!
Well, two things:
First, I’m reminded of good ol’ Mark Twain:
“Man is the only animal that blushes. Or needs to.”
(Maybe it’s not particularly apropos in your situation, but it sure is in B.’s.)
Second, maybe I’m immature, but if a guy (well, a guy closer to my age than 25 would be) tossed a paper airplane at me with that question on it, I’d probably be charmed all to pieces. (And because I’m not married, I’d probably giggle and check “yes” – that is, if he weren’t a total head-case or someone for whom “hygiene” was a merely hypothetical concept – and throw it back at him).
But then again: maybe I’m immature.
Honey, I feel your pain about the blushing.
My problem is that I don’t blush, per se, like you would think “blush,” a slight flush across the cheek. A delicate flower oh so gently reddened by the slight embarrassment. How cute that would be.
But, no. I get all blotchy and whelpy all the way down my chest and up my neck onto my face. HUGE red streaks that make people say, “What the hell happened to your neck? Did someone splash battery acid on you?”
It sucks.
(And I think the airplane was cute. Perhaps not as cute as he wanted it to be, but cute nonetheless.)
Maybe the airplane would be more cute in a less public venue — I mean, it just seemed that either way, one (or both) of us was going to be embarrassed. You know?
Lisa – member the Grey’s Anatomy episode about the girl who wanted to stop blushing? I so related to that. I can hide nothing. My cheeks give it away. Huge red spots, as though I’m an old lady putting on too much rouge – it’s mortifying!!
I hear you on the blushing! I can do that so easily – and I’ll blush at other people’s expense too. That really frustrates me.
It’ll be interesting to hear if B comes back to The Beanhouse.
The airplane is cute in theory – at least I’d think so –
it was the intent that was the problem.
Sounds like a joke that backfired on the joker.
“Oh, he’ll THINK about what he did.”
Heh.
P.S. People, please.
If you do Toys for Tots or some other equivalent toy drive, no Bratz, okay?
Because lots of these little girls don’t have the best role models in the world already and they don’t need the ho’-doll from hell nudging them down the road to hoochie-la-la-land.
Alas, they fly off the toy table – way more popular than dear old Barbie, the iffiest of whom looks like your favorite kindergarten teacher compared to these skanks.
Thanks. Seriously.
I have to say: your scanner is one of the best presents we ever got.
No, no, no, you’re all missing the point!! It’s not about blushing, or paper airplanes, or public spectacles!! Tracey’s STILL GOT IT!! Married or not, deep down inside all women (I assume) get a little thrill when noticed by a member of the opposite sex. When the “guy/boy” is a little younger, that can be even better. We can all tell Tracey BELOVES her Beloved, but its okay to be a liitle flattered!. Since I’m assuming Tracey is much younger than me, trust me, as we get older as women, you miss those unexpected innocent flirtations.
Heh – Sal, I love your rant about the Bratz dolls. I mean – they’re NAMED “Bratz.” Usually parents don’t want their kids to be (or be called) such a thing. I understand that “Scoutz” and “Role Modulz” are clunky names for toys, but could you try a little harder next time? Thanks!
Tracey – my Mom was getting hit on when I moved into the dorms freshman year, so I’ve had front row seating for an event like this. It was really weird. “Hello? This is my MOM. My DAD is standing at the other end of the hallway, measuring you like a hunter measures a skinned goat – and did I mention that HIS Dad was a butcher for 35 years, and Italian?” And then, later that year, a total table-turning… I was on one of the campus buses, looking at one of the most gorgeous women I’ve ever gazed upon. I smiled, she smiled… The bus pulled up to the stop and she rose, crossed the aisle, and leaned over to whisper in my ear:
“Lose the hat!”
I’m laughing now, remembering it – but at the time, my face probably looked radioactive. Beanhouse Boy will get over it, I’m sure, hopefully with a little wisdom and perspective thrown in.
How can I even begin to comment after these people?!?! CRACKED UP on the Bratz comment. Then there was the whole “measuring a skinned goat” one. WOW.
I’m laughing in my cube, and it ain’t pretty.
I think if it had been me, I would have been flattered, yet insulted. I guess he was trying to express interest w/o being so forward, so he went with a childish way of doing it. Oh well, he’ll get over it.
I think I’m too dark to blush. But oh, I know that whole my-face-is-reaching-the-boiling-point feeling.
Sal — I only know vaguely about Bratz — luckily, Piper is not interested in them, but a good warning nonetheless. I do NOT want that precious girl ever becoming a Brat.
NF — I am dying!!
/Lose the hat./
Like, what? A piece of advice so you’d be hotter? Oh, I would have died.
And, you know, the whole airplane stunt’s got me thinking. It was cute, in a way, but here’s my question — understanding, of course, that I haven’t been single in a while:
Would you want a guy deploying the cuteness strategy to ask you out on a date?
Imagine you’re in a bar or wherever and a guy sitting with all his friends floats a similar airplane to you as you sit with all YOUR friends. It’s public; they know, your friends know. I think the very cuteness of it puts pressure on the recipient to say yes when she might not want to say yes. It bumps it up a notch if it’s public. It’s like the guy who puts his marriage proposal on the giant screen at the football game and then the camera zeroes in on the girl, waiting for her answer. PRESSURE. You gotta be sure you’re gonna get a yes, I think, before you deploy the Cuteness Strategy. Like you dress up like a knight or whatever — uhm, which would personally make me GAG. Do NOT make your marriage proposal to me seem like we’re at a Ren Faire where there is leg ‘o’ mutton nearby.
Also ….
Does the Cuteness Strategy, of itself, push a girl over the edge to yes?
I dunno.
I guess I’d want a guy to either approach me or call me. It’s, uhm, more direct to me. I think he’s risking more because he’s making a personal approach. It takes more guts. I admire the guts that takes. Now, of course, the guy can make his “asking out” witty or self-deprecating and I’d LOVE that. I dunno. I’m all for the whimsy, really, but when a guy can’t approach me more directly … something’s missing. For me.
Understanding, as you all do, that I am not looking for someone to ask me out, so this is all hypothetical. 😉
Any thoughts on that?
sheila — (when did you switch from “red”? Did I miss that?)
Anyway … your comments went into moderation. I have no idea WHY. Sorry. And that Grey’s Anatomy episode — oh, I relate to that, too! LOVE that show.
My face doesn’t get blotchy — it gets ALL OVER red. Awful. Like I’m stroking out or something.
Okay, BEFORE reading the comments, my first reaction was the same as your number 3…how OLD are you? Seriously. The airplane was marginally cute. But the yes and no box? I am swept back to elementary school!
After reading the comments, I can see where some of you might find this cute, because there is something charming about Peter Pan. I have known Peter Pan. I have dated Peter Pan. But, benefit from my mistakes…please…this does NOT translate into anything worthwhile! Boys will definitely be boys, and no good comes from this.
Single ladies: If an adult man swoops a paper airplane with check boxes at you to ask you on a date, only check the “yes” box if you are looking for a party or meaningless sex. If you are looking for a “date”…someone you can get to know, and perhaps forge a relationship with…DO NOT that the time to check the “no” box…just RUN!!! Run fast and far and do not, under any circumstances, look back. His charming smile and the sweet blush will color your otherwise perfectly reasonable mind. It will be BAD BAD BAD.
Did I mention it will be BAD?
And Tracey…thanks for the laugh!
I have changed to “sheila”. This has happened in the last couple of days. DO NOT BE ALARMED.
It has happened everywhere except on my own blog – where I will still be “red”.
There is a method to my madness, but please don’t ask me to explain it, because I will sound even MORE insane!
I actualy think the airplane thing is kinda cute. Charming, geeky, and cute. I’d totally be charmed by it myself.
It’s just the image of you checking “NO” and lobbing it back across a crowded coffee house that REALLY cracked me up. hahahahaha
Also – can I just say how much I adore the image of you taking the airplane home, scanning it, uploading the image and posting it? Genius!!
Scoutz, heh heh. I asked Santa Claus for a Librarianz figure. The only way she can get longer tops and skirts (skirtz?) is if her grant proposal (I mean “propozal”) is accepted. (Can you tell I’m working on my final projects for the term and about to crack up?)
I had a very “elfin” classmate in high school named Colleen who blushed right to the tips of her ears. Of course she was embarrassed by it but I think a lot of other people found it very endearing. (Being the kind of person who didn’t like unwanted attention I wished people would leave her alone!)
At the risk of being totally un-P.C.–but provoked by tracey’s 5th question of “GAAAAY?”–are you sure yesterday wasn’t some sort of Take-a-good-looking-straight-responsible-person-type-out holiday unknown to hetero people and/or non-undergrad students? I mean, there are new holidays cropping up in December all the time, it seems.
Tracey – be very glad Bratz are not part of your world.
You just want to slap their sullen,pouty-lipped attitudinal faces. Yes, that is my reaction to a DOLL!
Plus, they look like you might pick up an STD just from touching them.
OK, so you’re saying B isn’t gay? 😉
I’m saying Who Knows??
Best post EVAHHHHH!!!!