I Is Awkward, Hear Me Roar

It's funny how being "awkward" has become the new, coveted cool. People actually take quizzes to prove their awkward-ability to their friends and take comfort in knowing that Marie Claire magazine has declared Taylor Swift to be just as awkward as anyone else (I mean that's a total lie). The truth of it all is, when someone is actually awkward, it doesn't work that way anymore. For instance: me. I used to be painfully awkward to the point where I knew not what to say to people in new conversation aka smalltalk ever. I would jump right into the most random corner of conversation possible before saying "how are you" or "what did you do last night." Although those things bore me, they aren't things that most people are comfortable skipping (refer to my last post where I speak about how geniuses must first master the basics). Not to declare myself as a genius, because I clearly just disproved that theory, but I like to think I was unique in being assuredly, consistently, painfully awkward to the point where there was such a thing as a "Classic Katie."

In today's world of Lena Dunham and celebrities such as the self-proclaimed "real" and "super awkward" pixie named Jennifer Lawrence, awkward is on the rise. Gone are the days when Audrey Hepburn and all of her perfection are the accepted, nay coveted, norm. In rush the days when embracing the extra five pounds and extra scraggly tooth around your eyebrow are widely accepted. Fine, teeth don't grow on eyebrows (huh?). This is all okay and funky and cool-tastic until one event happens: when someone proudly declares themselves awkward, they are no longer awkward. The very thing about being awkward is that you are often unable to accept or realize the fact without admitting that you tried to be otherwise. If you know that what you do is weird, the bubble has been burst...and I only chew Double Bubble Bubble Gum so that is quite impossible. But see, this puts me in a quasi sort of lame limbo (maybe that explains the lightheaded feeling I had earlier today). While I realize I have awkward tendencies, I am no longer as ashamed of them. Although, when someone who I don't know is only able to experience my awkward tendencies without being in the presence of the awesome ones, this creates a problem. I am no longer Jennifer Lawrence, saying awesome things then tripping over ballgowns; I am just awkward. And everything I say from thereon out will be seen as only rendering everyone in the room instantly uncomfortable. I have been told I have a gift for doing so (was a painful day). This true awkward is an isolated "herp" in a sea of "herp derps." The use of the entire phrase, aka awkward with funky, is understood by the gaggles (gaggles of geese and humans alike). The use of just "herp" just becomes weird, as is the awkward without the nifty-with-a-twist of cool.

So this is why Taylor Swift is not truly awkward. It's not that she is beautiful or even graceful that removes her from this category. As a matter of fact, she used to be awkward and it was because she was blissfully unaware not of the fact that she was but rather of what it was about her that made her be perceived as awkward. She has been groomed by society and expensive hairdressers etc. to comb the awkward right out of the mane that is her (ew). So when Marie Claire tries to call someone who has been so standardized by society as an "awkward" individual just to make the public feel more comfortable with themselves, I say nay. Calling someone awkward makes them feel more human and closer to the rest of us, but we don't realize is that not all of us are truly awkward.

I suppose the moral of the story is something like this: I suppose I should be glad I am awkward in a society where this is growing in acceptability (awkward wording lol) but hope I can remain that way while developing my suave self. Though this has yet to come out in full, I hope that one day, one year, in my fourth feline life, that I will be able to ask someone what they did last night. 

Get It

Get It. Those two words imply that one should thrust themselves at another individual interested in emotive confrontation. When I think of Get It, I think of some sexy version of a ready-to-pounce praying mantis strutting its mantis self across the mantis bar and in front of another mantis woman/man/however you want to swing that night. Now, here's why it makes no sense. How can "getting it" be comprised of angst, drive, and confidence when, in reality, we are a society addicted to playing Hard to Get? Get It (all of the puns)? If staying away is the very thing that attracts people the most (entirely different argument I will get to in a few minutes after casting my fists down in frustration at a similar scenario within which I currently reside...)...then how is directly, intentionally, and blatantly getting it gonna "git-er good" (may have just made that partially up)?

Here is a hypothetical "for instance." While I realize it is no longer hypothetical upon its morphing into a true-life Katie tale, I want to call it that for the sake of my pride and only a golden third of my diminished dignity. I wanted a guy. The End. Just kidding. I wanted a guy, I didn't know how to get the guy, my friend told me to go up to the guy. I did. And at first, he was very into the fact that I had mustered confidence enough to fool him into thinking I had a minute amount of swagger. Besides the fact that I immediately slipped on an ice cube and caught his shoulder on the way down, it was not that that eventually rendered him disinterested. If we're being honest, that only upped the interest. I mean really...who wouldn't want someone's frantic talons digging into their shoulder on a Friday night? Anyways. I began to text MooMoo (let's call him that, if not only to emasculate him, but at least to add humor to this sad tale). We texted back and forth back and forth. Then the texts became fewer and farther between. Was it because my text messages were sent four seconds too soon? Must I measure the thought put into each message in teaspoons of nervosa? Can I make nervosa a tangible thing so that I can measure it out with a spoon meant for stirring tea into sugar? The I started to text less.

Here's the problem. If you like someone, how do you "approach" them in a way that comes off as you "not approaching" them and being "disinterested" while being definitely and definably "interested?" Wut. While I realize it is customary within English society (those Brits) to wait quite a while before asking someone out, 'Merica is no place to hold feelings back. When people say Americans are forward, they are both wrong and possibly foreign to Earth. And I don't like to share my food with aliens so...leave. Americans are hesitant to discuss feelings of love and warmth and gushy stuff and things that make you feel like a guffawing, de-shelled armadillo but have no problem attacking you with fangs and stiletto heels if you accidentally cut them in line to get into Liv (for reference, I have not gone to Liv but, as a species foreign to said club, I can only imagine that, aside from wearing skirt/belt/invisible articles of clothing, these are activities club goers take part in). People will flip you off from cars and cut you off with baby strollers as you stumble to grab the wallet you just dropped (yes this did happen to me) before they tell you that you look not sexy, hot, or "smoky-dizzlin'" (this also happened), but pretty. And, if someone does call you pretty, the authorities must be alerted because oh my lord, Voldemort has a cousin and his name has just been mentioned. And so, in such cases, where people are afraid of interest, kindness, and eyeballs that look at not just their owners' phones but also at your eyeballs, what must one do?

Well...I don't know. I know little about things (definitely not vague). But what I do know is that I need to learn about balance. I too lose interest when the other party gains interest. Societal conditioning: please die. I need to learn both how to play "hard to get" and how to rise above it. Speaking of which (this is relevant...I swear)...my professor, who I commonly have a strong distaste for, said this: "Once you have mastered the basics, you can then move onto the genius." Funny how so may geniuses come off as having gone their entirely own, crookedly carved out, quasi path, but in actuality have skid down the same road as everyone else (Van Gogh is a true exception to this rule). This also applies to "gettin' it." Once you have learned the traditional manner in which one might acquire a lady/man friend/person, you can then go on to lure others in with methods other than the traditional "hard to get." Stupid how "hard to get" has become tradition, right? This is when the direct confrontation comes into play. The people who can pull that off have probably already pulled the weasely side nonsensicality (definitely not a word) of "hard to getting." The irony of this situation is this: One would think that learning to confront people/problems/large lizards head on, they could then use those methodologies to manipulate people from afar (literally). What I have found is...not that. Learn the back roads then you can make the dash to the home stretch.

And so, as I begin to remember a dream I had last night (somehow including a super-old Brad Pitt), I realize that, it is possible to get Brad Pitt. I might be 90 when I do, but if I learn how to play hard-to-get, maybe by then I will realize what to say if I walk up to him in a bar...if those still exist when I'm a prehistoric rag. Good night and good luck to all those tryna get-it-in as I lazily rock myself asleep to an episode of Scandal.