If you ask any of my friends or acquaintances what their honest first impression of me was, I’m willing to bet that neither "friendly", "approachable", nor any synonym of those words will be on the list. Sure, they may think I’m really bubbly and talkative now, but I’m certain that wasn’t the case when we first met.
In Grade School and High School, we had this exercise at the end of every school year where they would make the class sit in a circle and we would go around telling each other our first impressions of them. “When we first met I thought you were a real know-it-all.” “On the first day of class you were so bossy!” “I knew from the very beginning that you and I would become great friends – and we did!” Obviously, that last comment was a rarity. Most of the comments tended to be negative and though this made for an extremely uncomfortable afternoon (as most people couldn’t look each other in the eye for the remainder of the day), it was the whole point of the exercise. The teachers wanted us to learn what other people’s first impressions of us were so that we would be able to change (those negative ones) or develop (the positive ones) by the time the next school year rolled around. The idea was that if we knew that we had a tendency to grate on people’s nerves when we first meet them then we’d make an effort to be more agreeable the next time around.
Every single year, without fail, when it was my turn to listen to people’s comments about meeting me for the first time, I would always be described as aloof, standoffish, unapproachable, haughty, and indifferent. I’m pretty sure it frustrated the faculty since I didn’t seem to be getting the point of the exercise; I was already told tons of times that I come off as cold so why wasn’t I making an effort to be friendlier?
The thing is, I like being unapproachable. I abhor making petty small talk with strangers or people who simply don’t interest me. I know that these people mean well and are just trying to be friendly but more often than not, I find friendliness obtrusive and at times even impertinent. Frankly, a forced conversation about the weather or the traffic that will eventually fade into uncomfortable silence in 3 minutes is just a waste of my time and saliva. I’d rather have a decent chat with the voices in my head (ha ha!). Pretty much, unless a person is wearing a Phantom half-mask or an “I love Duran Duran” t-shirt, then chances are I won’t give them the time of day. I suppose that’s why I love Mr. Darcy so much: I can totally relate to the way he conducts himself with others – but that’s a topic for another blog.
Seeming (or being) standoffish works to my advantage: it saves me from having to make pathetic small talk AND it proves that the people who do talk to me in spite of my intentionally repelling physiognomy are brave souls and are therefore worth talking to. It seemed pretty foolproof until I moved to this blasted county. A trick that seemed to work like a charm back home suddenly has no effect in America. I don’t know if I suddenly morphed into a friendly and welcoming looking person or if Americans are just immune to my “do not disturb” countenance but lately, total strangers have been talking to me and it irritates the heck out of me. Just this afternoon, while I was browsing the DVD shelf at the library, the guy next to me asks me if I’ve seen the movie he was holding up. I look around, realize that there’s no one else he could possibly be talking to other than me, give him a curt “Nope”, then continue flipping through the DVDs. Unperturbed by my curt, one word reply, he rattles off “Well, you should! It’s a great movie: its about these guys . . .yadda, yadda, yadda.” I ignore him and pray that he thinks I’m some pompous bitch and leaves me alone but noooo. He goes on: “ How about this one? Have you seen this one?”
I sigh. “No. Those aren’t the type of movies I watch.”
I indiscreetly wave my Austen and E.M. Forster “corset movies” under his nose and give his basket of horror B-movies a disdainful look.
“Well, this is a good one” he continues to my absolute dismay “Its about a gang in the 1930s…” I swear, I wanted to go Nikki/Jessica Sanders on him. Why wouldn’t the guy let me browse in peace?
And yesterday, I was sitting on the train on my way to work with a book held 4 inches away from my nose AND my iPod plugged into my ears. You’d think I’d be left alone but nope: just as I was getting to the good part, I hear a bright and cheery “So, whatcha reading there?”
Um, hel-lo? iPod? Can’t hear you. I ignore the ‘Casper the Friendly Ghost’ wannabe but a beat later I feel a poke on my knee and look up before I can catch myself.
“What’s the book about?” the annoyance asks again with a big smile. Cheerfulness and friendliness should be illegal before 9am.
I just don’t understand why people persist in talking to me. I mean, aren’t iPods the universal sign for “Fcuk off!”?
I’m so tempted to wear this shirt everyday but knowing these bloody friendly Americans, they’ll just think its an interesting conversation starter and ask me about it. Can I possibly get a restraining order on the world?
