What A Deal 4 October 1998

My slightly gross hint of the day: don't pick your teeth after reading the newspaper for the last hour. Yecccch.

Now, then. Man, speaking of Losers. There's a reason why I identify with those teams, I suppose. We get right up to the brink of success and then hit a rock. The most recent evidence, on my part, being yet another unsuccessful attempt to raise an online acquaintance up to the level of actual, in-person socializing. I know, whining about it is pointless and boring, however tempting. It might be that this urge to understand Why is part of the problem - that this, too, is one of those things where nobody knows why it's like that. I'm sure the frustration of pointless speculation shows through.

From what I gather from other people I know, this is a tough time all around anyway. I don't think I'll ever really get how scary it can be for women to meet men they don't know. I mean, geez, I'm not scary. Ah but that's just the rub - "scary" doesn't just mean physically threatening, as big a concern as that can be. It can also mean being the kind of person that they wouldn't normally encourage, for whatever personal reasons, and that can definitely sometimes mean guys just like me. It might not, too, of course, but turning out wrong can carry big consequences.

The strange flip side of that is that it rewards salesmanship - not exactly a hallmark of sincerity. Maybe that kind of personality is just more of a known quantity - you might not have met him before, but you've met guys like him, the game is predictable. I dunno, I'm just guessing. Drives me nuts, though, it does. There's a reason I've never been able to hold any kind of sales job - I can't tolerate it. Can not.

I remember the time that, though strange circumstances, I spent a summer selling a one-volume encyclopedia door-to-door in upstate New York. When I was out walking alone down the road through the pastureland, singing nonsense songs at full volume and watching those huge clouds go by, it was pretty fine. But the time would eventually come that I had to go up and talk to someone, and try to talk them into something, and my insides wanted to crawl right up out of my mouth and hide in a ditch until it all went away.

People are confusing, people are confused. We don't want what we want, we want what we don't want. No great revelation, I guess. Well, now that I've thought all my mature thoughts, it's time to go sulk. Because if I can't act like a child, what's the point of being a grownup? Whole industries would collapse.

Willfully blind self-indulgent nebbish or amusingly quirky old coot? And how bout that local sports team? Discuss among yourselves.

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