Yes, My Socks are Red Despite the Fact that the Rest of My Outfit is Black

For those of you who haven't figured it out yet, I have a bit of a social anxiety disorder. Which explains why I'll tentatively plan on going to something but then not show up. (I can hear the quiet ping of a million lightbulbs going off in people's heads right now.) If you haven't figured this out yet, it's either because you are very very thick, or because I AM THE MASTER OF ILLUSION! *clicking both sets of fingers and vanishing into a cloud of smoke*

In this regard, I am a glorious paradox--I am retardedly self-assured in opinion and presentation, I will confront people when I think what they're doing is not right, I tend to not be aware of the fact that my clothes produce an unusual effect until someone points it out (I met my first boyfriend because he was strangely attracted to my complete incongruity in sock-color in relation to the rest of my outfit), I have hairy pits, I am opinionated and happy to share said opinions, I am a bit of a spectacle, and yet I have social anxiety disorder. Go figure.

It's like being a speed-reader but then finding out you're dyslexic.

I like to think it's because I am brilliant and of genius-level intelligence, which makes my ability to interact with "normal" human beings on their level an impossibility (*doing a little soft-shoe while waiting for the snickers to subside*) but in reality, I think it mainly stems from a discomfort with and fear of finding myself at the center of attention, a fact which never ceases to amaze people who apparently think that I dress and speak and think the way I do solely because I want to be the center of attention. People: There are people in the world who are just weird and/or different and (for the most part) don't even realize that they are until someone points it out to them.

Welcome to me, myself, and I.

Anyways, the fun part of the social anxiety disorder is that I will usually have a beer or something before going somewhere, which usually eases up some of those nervous feelings. But it also always results in me announcing to some person or another: "I am anti-social." Sometimes completely out of the blue. I don't know why I feel the need to point this out--maybe to explain away my complete lack of social abilities and my ineptitude in making small talk (which I detest). (I am the type of person who is so socially awkward that when (s)he makes a lame attempt at joking about something/somebody, what (s)he is joking about suddenly appears on the scene, to his/her complete dismay--historically it's been "priests," I kid you not, but the deaf and the mentally-challenged also have made surprise guest-appearances as well.) All this of course, shock of shocks, serves only to confuse them and further anti-socialize myself from the people around me (yes, that is a verb). I end up feeling even more socially awkward than I did while trying to psych myself up to go in the first place, and this just feeds into my anxiety the next time round. This is why sometimes I just decide last minute that, fuck it, I'm just gonna stay home and watch a bad horror movie and drink shitty beer instead.

(Thankfully, not since my grad school poetry reading, though, have I found myself whispering loudly to the people I know at a social event that "I'm so drunk--teehee!")

But, ladies and gents, I think I've figured out a solution (one that seems like it'd have a much higher success-rate than just telling myself over and over before going somewhere that "It's ok if I go and people think me the most socially disturbing repellent person they've ever met. They may very well think this, but WHAT DOES IT MATTER?"):

I think maybe if I start going around making out with folks at said gatherings, it'll distract me (and them) from the social awkwardness of the situation. Whether it will end up being a good distraction or a bad distraction is debateable and will also lend both fun and mystery to this solution, which makes it all the more brilliant. And either way, it will distract!

So problem solved.

I would make the best therapist ever.

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