Coming Clean

You know, sometimes, I can be a real ass-hole. Maybe not in the Mooninite sense – it’s not like I do whatever I want to whomever I want, at all times (obscure reference, my apologies). What I’m getting at is that I’m not a traditional or even a frequent ass-hole, but I certainly have the capacity. As a sort of self-exploration exercise, I thought I’d talk about the flaws that I see in myself.

Which brings me to my first one, I’m terribly afraid of confrontation. Physical, emotional, whatever – I hate to fight, and I hate it when people are angry with me. I’ve never really had to deal with physical confrontation, as I don’t pick fights or do anything to piss someone off that much. Well, there was that one time that Carrie convinced me to try and sneak into a TKE party with her to find Christina. We knocked over the big plank that was blocking the back entrance and then I had an angry brother bearing down on me. I paid $10 (though the cover would’ve only been $6 – but I wasn’t going ask for change) in order to avoid the ass kicking I assumed I would receive. I digress.

Like I was saying, most of my confrontations are emotional ones, and they usually have to do with Vicki. I usually do everything I can to stop a fight as soon as one starts. I’d rather let an issue lie than try to fix a problem that seems unsolvable. This is linked to my next problem: I lie like a bastard.

Not big lies, really. I do tell white lies pretty constantly, working under the “what they don’t know won’t hurt them logic.” A lot of things I lie about are things that I do that might hurt someone’s feelings or something someone asked me to do that I just haven’t gotten to yet. I generally feel that people’s feelings get hurt because they assume things that just aren’t true, so I go about doing whatever I want to do and then lie to cover them up. Unfortunately, I’m either a terrible liar or Vicki is an excellent lie detector, because I rarely get away with things. It truly is unfortunate, too, because sometimes she takes offense and assumes that I must be feeling a certain way towards her that, while I understand why she may think that, it simply isn’t the case. I’d be happy to share examples as embarrassing as they may be, but I don’t think that Vicki would approve, so that’s that. Next issue!

I’m pretty selfish. It’s an awkward thing really, because I really am a very generous person, in a material sense. When I have money, I throw it around like no ones business. Sadly, I rarely have money, so I look like a cheapskate often enough. Someday, I’ll repay my debts, that much I swear. I’m more emotionally selfish – insensitive, if you will. I couldn’t tell you why, but I seem almost incapable of putting myself in someone else’s emotional shoes. The most common example is, of course, with Vicki and I. I’ll do something and really not think about it how it may affect her. For instance, we always fight about how I don’t do enough nice things for her – you know, flowers, cards, and all that stuff. Myself, I’m the kind of person that feels happy to just be with her, and I fail to consider that she may need more than that. The way I see it, I’m happy with just being together with her, why can’t she be? It’s sweet and all, but really quite unfair. See, I told you I’m a jerk.

I’m the same way with people’s stuff. Like, if someone lets me borrow something or lends me some money, I’m gracious but I’m never overwhelmed by their kindness. I feel that way because I know that I would do the same for them if given a chance. Three of my biggest debts: Jim and Jeff let me crash at their place for a whole summer, rent free, and Jim gave me a ride into work every morning. If I had an apartment to myself, I would be glad to let any of my friends crash there for any period of time. This past summer, Brian let me use his car while he was in California, and I put quite a few miles on it. Had the roles been reversed I would have done the same for him. The third is to Vicki, who’s done more nice things for me than I count. To her, I owe everything – and one day, I hope to give her just that.

So, for those of you who know me, if I ever seem like I don’t appreciate something that you’ve done for me, don’t fret. I truly do appreciate all the kindness I’ve been given, and I promise that I will honor all debts to the best of my abilities. This will probably sound terrible, but part of the reason I may come off as an ingrate is because… I almost expect kindnesses from others. Part of it is probably because I’ve always been treated well, but another part of it is because I’m naïve enough to believe that a lot of people are as generous as I am with material things. I feel like I would do nice things for people, so I expect that they will do nice things for me. It sounds stupid, I know – but try me. I am no deadbeat.

What else… I’m pretty stoic. Look if up if you don’t know it. Dictionary.com is wonderful. Anyways – I’m not sure if stoicism is really a flaw. Depends who you ask, I suppose. I’m not terribly emotional or affectionate towards pretty much anything. I’ve definitely grown more affectionate, but I still don’t talk about or show my emotions so much. I’m lukewarm with just about everything – I’m rarely really excited or really sad – just shades of those feelings. I think I’ve cried maybe once since adolescence, though I’ve come close a few times. Some people have said that I seem emotionless, but that’s not the case at all. It’s really just a matter of how I display my feelings – I don’t. I do feel things, I just don’t often find it necessary to share my feelings. It’s like what I said in my first post on this Blog – I just don’t believe that my stories (or my feelings) could be that interesting to others.

Which is ironic, really, because I’m really very arrogant. Arrogant to a fault, even. It’s not the sort of arrogance where I believe I’m better than everyone else, or the vanity where I admire my own abilities. I used to have a horrible self-image. My arrogance is very centralized one – there are certain things that I know I am good at and certain instances where I believe I am always right.

Why do you think I failed out of college? Arrogance. Some people claim it was laziness, and I’ll admit that that had something do with it. With all honesty, however, I believe that the primary factor in my fall from the pillars of academia was, without a doubt, arrogance. I don’t believe that I’m good looking, I don’t believe that I’m strong, I know I have little common sense, but one thing that I know for certain is that I am fucking smart. See what I mean? I’m a cocky son-of-a-bitch about some things.

The reason I flunked out was not that I was not smart enough or that I was too lazy. My failure was primarily based on arrogance and a lack of passion. I was an English major – which basically means that I would read a book, go to class, and then talk about the book. I’d write a few papers and maybe take a final, and that was that. I struggled through most of my classes because they were so painfully boring. Soon enough, I just stopped going. Sometimes I didn’t even read the books. I would just bluff my way through some papers and if I came out with a C or better, I was happy. Considering that I put about an E-level of effort into some of these papers, getting a C just reinforced my cockiness. I wasn’t proud of a C, but I wasn’t here to impress anybody – I was here to get a degree so that everyone would pat me on the head and tell me I was a good kid.

That was the other thing – a lack of passion. I really wasn’t in college for the right reasons. I wasn’t there to learn. It’s not that I didn’t want to learn anything – I just didn’t care for having books written by long-dead authors chewed up and regurgitated at me, picked apart and overanalyzed, as “academics” tend to do. If you couldn’t tell, I’m really rather bitter about the whole academia thing – I think that some people think they’re too smart and frankly just rape all the joy right out of good literature with all their analyzing. Then there are others who think they’re too smart and that they see some hidden goodness in books that are just bad writing. My final paper for my Literary Theory class was about how stupid Literary Theorists were. Isn’t that priceless?

After my first couple of semesters, professor’s attendance policies grew stricter as my attendance dwindled. The first dismissal came, but I got an appeal. It didn’t even faze me. A written appeal? That’s another area where I am arrogant… I consider myself a pretty good wordsmith. People have told me that since I’ve been writing – I have a way with words. I employed them well, and I bluffed my way into another semester at Geneseo. I was even brazen enough to tell the committee overseeing my dismissal exactly what I’ve written here – I don’t go to class because I’m too arrogant. I’m really quite brutally honest when it’s appropriate.

So I went back for another semester, but I never wanted to be there for academic reasons. I went back because my life was at Geneseo now, because Vicki and my parents would be disappointed if I didn’t, because I would be “just another loser” without a degree. I rarely felt like I was learning while I was at college. I really didn’t care. If I had had more common sense, I’d have done well enough to stay and make living arrangements easier out here. But my heart just wasn’t in it. So I failed again, and this time I was dismissed for real – but damn, I put up a good fight. That’s a story for another time – I’m already running pretty long here.

Anyway, I think I’ve run out of bad things to say about myself for the time being. Wait – one less thing. I have a tendency to forget about people when they aren’t there. I did it with my friends at home, I did it with my friends from freshman year, and I may just do it to my friends here when we part ways. I really feel sorry for that – if any of you are reading this, I’m sorry that I haven’t kept in touch as much as I should. It’s like I said, I’m an ass-hole sometimes. I’m going to try and be better – but if I don’t, forgive me. I’m as bad at goodbyes and I am at reunions, so if I’ve faded out of your life, I’m sorry – but know that you are not forgotten. Thanks.

Peace,
Mike