A Doofus Once Said

    I once spoke to a nutty kid. And it wasn't me...this time. Promise. This man/boy brought up an interesting point that I took particular note of in my book (Blues Clues style). He spoke of the "odd man out" and how he intentionally and continually put himself in situations where he could exist as exactly that. Essentially, he thrived in situations where he was the only oddity versus being around people similar to him. He said he felt his creativity was diluted when he surrounded himself with more of...himself. You would think that would be the opposite case, that he would be more creative in that setting...yes/no/not today? Well, I thought about what he said, and now I'm going to say a thing about that thing.
     When I came to Miami, I walked into my dorm room, sucked in a mouthful of mold from the rotting linoleum below my feet, and put my head down to weep. I wanted to fall into a hole...but not hit the water below-that would be too easy. I felt alone and threatened by all of who I thought were the idiots around me. Little did I know, I could use some of those idiots to my advantage. Those morsels of moron would unknowingly help to craft what I now call Me.
       Before realizing this, I decided I needed to leave Miami. And...after a few painful months, I did just that. I went to fashion school where there were a million Katies...but they all had pink hair...or weirder shoes...or weirder outfits. I, in this situation, felt normal and creatively diffused. How is it possible that my derpy outfits looked sane on the streets of Chicago? This was my big rebellion and I was looking like a half-decorated cupcake. I wanted to be a damn fully decorated pancake (I wanted to make sure I used a metaphor that made the absolute least sense).
     When I came back to Miami after a few logistical avalanches, I fled for a semester abroad, came back, and then realized what was up. Oh, my. Maybe there was a reason I wasn't friends with very many artsy people. And maybe I ended up at this school for a reason other than to feel like a foreigner from the no-longer-existent-negative-terranium that is Pluto. For one, I am not a hippy dippy, although I partake in most activities that would define me as such. And, Dear World, stop calling me a hipster. my white skorts and printed pants define me as no such thing. I am a transitional chameleon, not a bearded lumberjack. But most importantly, I unknowingly loved to surround myself with people who made me feel even stranger, even more unique, and much more at...unease. I was almost in competition with myself to see which side of me could out-weird the other. "Who's gonna jump off the cliff into "freakdom" first, blehehehe."
     And so, this anti-global warming, spotty-haired man/child planted this seed of "hm" into my mind. Actually, it's one of the more important seeds that have grown in the garden. Of all the ideas I have planted in the past year, this might be one that will stick with me for a long time. Does this mean I'll stay in Miami for much longer? Pfft. We'll see.

Out.

Yogurt Kickflips

    I opened a container of yogurt, proceeded to scoop up a glob with my spoon and watched as I flung it into my eye and spilled the rest onto my pants. And these weren't just any pants. These were the only pants I had with me, the ones I would be flying back to America while wearing. Great. Now they were covered with pink, slimy, probably spoiled, yogurt. I guess it could be nice to enjoy some homemade sour cream as an afternoon snack.
     So I have this thing where my limbs flail uselessly in erratic patterns the minute I want to impress anyone at all who I could ever possibly care to dazzle in any lifetime. Except this time, the only thing dazzling about this situation was the specks of glossy berry chunks bubbling to the surface of my yogurt. Yum.
     For about two months before this, I had my eye on a certain guy in the dining hall. To be specific, a dining hall at the university in England where I previously studied abroad. We would make obscenely frequent eye contact across the hall as he sat in a similar spot every day, across from the table I sat at with my mixed breeds of study abroad friends. He dressed in a European chic manner that I so frequently coveted. I mean offense to all when I say how American men know not how to adorn their bodies. Sandals? No. Tanks? I have little interest in your knotted armpit hair. He, on the other hand, wore maroon and mustard scarves with suede loafers and lush sweaters. Even though he wore them each a million times, he always looked great.
     I had been thinking all semester how I could possibly approach him. I even thought I would just go up to him and his friends and exclaim something along the lines of: "you know what? I see you, you see me. I'm Katie." That would have been nice if I hadn't intentionally derailed myself to take a nonexistent phone call...three times. And anyways, this was a two-way street, right? Did he not have legs that could move in walking formation? Toward me?
    As the semester was about to conclude, I counted down the days I had to approach him. Sometimes if I went to breakfast at 8:37 I could catch him on his way out as we collided while awkwardly handling bowls of cereal sliding around on slimy trays. I hadn't dropped anything yet, plus my eye contact was steady and calm. I even think I almost came off as collected in his eyes. I usually wore my grandma's fancy Canadian coat that combined black suede and fancily braided wool. I wore this with a nude leather backpack, Doc Martens, and the same knitted gray scarf. Plus my hair was red. Maybe I looked cool? My mom thought I looked like a punky troll doll. So did I.
     Back to the last day at the dining hall. I woke up, smeared on my face, pulled my same coat over my shoulders, and made my way to breakfast at 8:20. Maybe this time I could sit down and stare at him. Maybe he would stare back at me and we would both throw our hands up in a "well, shit. YOLO right?" kind of way (the use of that stupid acronym is appropriate here. I will now never use it again). Oddly enough, one of my English friends came into the dining hall and started...speaking to the guy?? What was this? How did I not know of this connection? After replaying a facepalm motion over and over again in my mind, I stood up. As soon as I did, my friend sat down to eat with me. A minute later, the guy also sat down. This was his way in. A few minutes after that, my English friend left and I was sitting alone with the guy I had been staring at all semester. My voice began to shake, I started laughing too much as I do when I get nervous, and I lost all sense of coordination. How wrong could I really go with only toast and a yogurt on my tray? The answer as we all now know is this: the wrongest of the wrong. Upon digging the spoon into my yogurt, I made the equivalent of a skateboarding kick-flip with my utensil and watch half of my yogurt spray not only on my pants but all over my face and the ground. I then watched as the yogurt cup splatted to the ground. How. How did this happen.
     Of course as soon as this all happened, my face turned red, and my guy felt uncomfortable. Four of my friends just walked into the dining hall, all aware of my enormous crush, came over, and started cackling like buffoons. Although I made some serious light of the situation, this guy wasn't having it. He was too cool for me. But, at the end of the day, if he was too cool for me, it wasn't meant to be. It was almost better as a fantasy inside my head. If I ruin printed pants with sour yogurt while on a date with any of you, laugh or we're done. Actually, I'm now lactose intolerant. Let's skip the yogurt thing and go for vegan cupcakes.

Out.