Let me preface this entry with a bit of my own bias. I was once told by a reader of a previous blog that I was an entertaining writer, but I tended to put people in categories. Which is fair. No one is ever certain if their own observations match the observations of others. While I may think I am merely identifying what is already there, others may see me putting labels on what is not…or oversimplifying what is. With this entry, I let the reader decide.
Last night, I went to a bar for a friend’s birthday. Which wouldn’t be newsworthy at all had it not been for the fact that I don’t go to bars often. And I don’t typically respond well to strangers trying to flirt with me. This unfortunate combination typically creates some interesting events and observations–today I focus on the “type of guys” one finds hitting on you at a bar.
I haven’t been to enough bars throughout the country to know if these people are everywhere, but my guess is they are…and I have assembled a short list of some possible ways to spot them:
1. They will only talk to you about the here and the now (example: “Do you like that drink? “How you doin’ tonight?” “Can I buy you a beer?”)
2. With this comes their hope for instant gratification, a hope that poisons everything they do (deconstruction of their thoughts: I will buy this North face jacket in hopes of gaining status. I will dress like I just came from work, so “ladies” will think I’m successful. I will buy my clothes from generically cool clothing stores and use terms like “bumper sticker liberal” incorrectly so I will gain status with my “bros.”)
3. They have a fondness to pretentiously show how un-pretentious they are. (example: “I will only drink American beers because I don’t need to drink that expensive import shit.”)
4. They frequently talk about how they’re “living the dream”…yet they can be found every Friday and Saturday night at the same bars, mass-produced and nondescript. The American dream, folks.
I understand most people can be guilty of some of the same cultural group-think…the hipster identity, the ever growing blue collar/”red neck” identity, the coffee-drinking intellectual identity, and so forth…but don’t each of these crowds merely represent a bunch of unsatisfied human beings trying to make their entire self fit a certain quintessential mold?
And ironically, each of these groups never get along because they’re each so hung up on their own causes of “only drinking green tea on Thursdays” or “only listening to Bright Eyes in the car” or “only watching sports and drinking Bud Light when it rains.”
These people are boring. Why are they boring, you ask? Because their system is predictable. And why is this even a bad thing? Because predictability and comfort hinders progress and growth to become better people. If you are not exploring, you are not learning. And if you aren’t learning new things or finding new ways to become a better, more worthy individual, you might as well be dead.*
Therefore, I would like to start a new identity called identity where we all just have one that we can make as we please.
And these ”types” would say to each other: “My name is Bob and sometimes I eat potato chips, but other days I like a nice salad. Occasionally I listen to Neil Diamond in my footy pajamas, but I also consider myself a professional wrestler.”
And we’d all go around thinking I’m not quite sure what to think of Bob. Because we aren’t accustomed to not being able to read the symbolic clues we give each other to distinguish where we stand on these hot button issues of to gel or not to gel. Or to tuck or not to tuck. To wear pink or not to wear pink.
I think I’ll wear pink. But like green better. And be done with it.
-The Leftovers
*Of course, this is especially my mindset since I am a young, healthy individual with, potentially, quite a few years to become a complacent, predictable person with two kids and a mini-van.
