As someone who regularly stutters, stumbles, bumbles, and tumbles over trying to form words with her mouth, especially when in the presence of another human being, technology is the best thing that has ever happened to me. I'm infinitely better at writing than talking. This explains why people like my blog more than they like the actual me.

Need to tell someone off? Send them a Facebook message! Is that not soap boxy enough for you? Post it publicly to their wall! Cryptic diary entries are a thing of the past. Why spend all that time penning about your life's angst when you can just vaguely tweet about it? Are you looking for that perfect way to say "I care enough about you to remember that you exist, but not enough to actually talk to you"? There's this wonderful invention called the text message!

The world is sunshine and rainbows and gigabytes and pixels.

However, even if it is technological communication, it's still communication. People are still involved with communication. In this case, there are going to be some flaws.

The major drawback with talking electronically is that it's impersonal. After a while, there hardly feels like any difference between talking to your friends and talking to Cleverbot. It's all too easy to forget that there is a person on the other end, a live person with opinions and standards and feelings and stuff. As a result, we do things that would never ever fly in real life interaction.

Here are some things that I have observed exclusively in technological communication, and how they would translate in 3D socialization. (3D Socialization sounds like another really bad premise for a 3D movie.)

1. Instant messaging availability never means what you think it means.

IM clients have this handy little feature that allows you to be able to tell if a certain friend of yours is available to talk or not. In my head, this is how that should work:

Online: I'm rearing and ready to talk to!
Away: I'm away from my computer. I probably won't respond if you try to contact me. Because I'm away.
Busy: I'm preoccupied with something really important, like curing cancer or splitting an atom. Don't disturb me.
Offline: I'm in no way, shape, or form associated with my IM client right now.

This is what it actually means:

Online: I forgot to put myself in "away" mode.
Away: I forgot to put myself in "online" mode.
Busy: I don't have the balls to remove people that annoy me off of my buddy list, so I'm perpetually in "busy" mode, avoiding them.
Offline: I'm in invisible mode! I will instant message you as if I have been resurrected from the dead!

I'm petrified to instigate chat conversations because my friends expect me to be psychic or Hermione Granger or something.

Put in real-life perspective:

Your friend is sitting at a table. You walk over to them and greet them. Whenever you attempt to say anything to them, they respond, "I am away from this table right now."

2. Electronic goodbyes matter, too.

After studying quantum physics to find out that you and your friend are both online at the same time, you engage them in conversation. You know, conversation. That thing where you are both saying things to one another. After a questionable gap in this conversation, you look at your buddy list. That's when you notice.

They're no longer online.

Whatever happened to, "Hey. My person is going to leave the computer now. I just thought I'd let you know, so you don't wait up for my response that is never going to come or anything."? Even if there are lulls in conversation, or you both get distracted, it's still common courtesy. You say goodbye to that old high school friend you awkwardly engage in Wal*Mart even though you have nothing to talk about. This shouldn't be any different.

Put in real-life perspective:

You're talking to your friend. Suddenly, they get up and walk away from you, with no explanation whatsoever.

3. The many complexities of text messaging.

Actually, there's just one complexity: People suck at it.

The whole premise of texting is that you can carry all of your friendships in your pocket. Your friends can and will try to talk to you any day, at any time. There is rarely any urgency involved. You can reply to them at your utmost leisure. That's the blessing, as well as the curse.

You see, people are a bit too leisurely and not enough "utmost" when it comes to text messaging. People have busy lives. Or at least I assume that they do, because I'm between jobs and have the free time to be on top of my social life like some sort of ninja wizard. If it takes a couple hours to respond, that's okay. If it takes more than just a couple, that's also okay. That's about how long a work day is.

However, a full day? Multiple days? Never? What kind of person pours 10% of their earnings into a cell phone bill and then never checks it for messages?

The excuses are awesome, when you actually have the benefit of hearing them. "I'm so sorry I didn't respond to you! My phone was stolen by goblins, and I had thirteen hours to meander through this super complicated maze to get it back!" "Oh, really? That sounds an awful lot like Labyrinth." "...Yeah..."

Some situations are easy to explain. If you impale your friend with texts and they never respond, the truth is they probably don't like you. Other situations? Not so easy. There have been times when I've gotten a text from a friend, and I responded in a timely manner like a normal person. However, no response. Never a response. Was this person not holding their cell phone in their hands three minutes ago? The only scenario I can think of where that can actually happen is if they chuck their phone across a field, and then start sprinting in the opposite direction.

Put in real-life perspective:

You ask your friend a question, and they answer your question three days later. Either that your they talk to you next week, never acknowledging the fact that you asked them a question at all.


Yet, regardless of all of this, I would still deal with a confusing IM conversation over blundering through a two hour phone call.

Hello! I'm going to die one day, and so are you! (Whitnicism: the Feel-Good Blog of 2011.)

For starters, here are the three main components to understanding me:

1. I'm an incredibly anxious person.
2. Anxiety causes me to over think everything. And I mean everything.
3. Over thinking allows me to come to weird epiphanies, seemingly out of absolutely nowhere.

I've found, unsurprisingly, that these three ideas are hard for the majority of people to grasp individually, nevertheless combine and interweave together. (Don't feel too bad. I'm me, and I don't know what my brain is doing half the time.) However, that is the only way I could think of to explain how I went from relaxing after a busy weekend to pondering my mortality.

Last night there I was, rag curls in my hair, playing multiplayer iPod Touch Solitaire against a person who was too good at Solitaire to have any kind of social life. Then the thought came: 'Whitney. As far as anyone knows, you have one life to live on this Earth. And you're using this precious time tying rag curls and getting your ass handed to you on a platter via online Solitaire. Are these the moments you're going to tell your grandchildren about?'

Then I had an overwhelming urge to burst through the front door of my house and start living as much life as I could possibly find. I pondered everything from buying a plane ticket to Europe to finding a stranger to make out with. Unfortunately, it was midnight. I'm also broke, and throwing myself at the first attractive male I find while wearing rag curls isn't a much better story for the grandchildren. "And that, whippersnappers, was the night your father was conceived." Feeling like I had exhausted all of my options, I found myself a more evenly matched opponent on Solitaire.

As John Mayer put it in a song, I'm going through a "quarter-life crisis." Don't get me wrong. In my short life, I've gotten to do some pretty awesome things. I've been places. I've met people. I even fell in love that one time, even if it was with the undeniably wrong person. There are so many things left to be done, however, that I don't even know where to get started. I realized that the time to do these things is now, while I'm still young and fancy free.

I began to mentally compile my bucket list. It included what I considered to be the essentials: Figure out what I want to do with my life, and then go to school for that thing. Travel everywhere, a lot. Fall in love again, hopefully with the undeniably right person this time. Probably make him my husband. Have children with said husband that look vaguely like me, and hopefully act even more vaguely like me. You know, the basics.

However, there are a few things I've always wanted to do that are a bit...outlandish. As I daydreamed, each new bucket list item became more ludicrous than the last. Here are some examples. These are mostly unrealistic expectations that I've drawn from watching movies.

1. Be Involved in an Over-the-Top Introduction

I've always wanted to enter a room full of dozens, if not thousands, of people highly anticipating my arrival. My original plan that would have fulfilled this goal was to be a guest on Oprah. I'm not even a huge fan of Oprah. I just think I have a great Oprah announcing name. ("Whitneeeey HowAAAAAARD!")

With my Oprah dreams dashed, I must set my sights elsewhere. The current vision involves anything from a large gymnasium to a small stadium. My arrival will be announced via microphone, megaphone, or some other voice projecting device that more than likely starts with "m" and ends in "phone." There are balloons, metallic confetti, and/or streamers. There is either a marching band or that song they use to pump you up for basketball games is blaring through the speakers. I dance down the aisles toward a stage, and there are plenty of high fives to go around.

My only flaw with this plan is why I would be there in the first place, and how such a grand announcement for me of all people would be necessary. I'm an awkward public speaker (or public do anything-er) and I tend to avoid large crowds. As soon as the announcement is over, my mind draws a blank over what happens next. I assume I just stand there awkwardly for about thirty seconds and then leave the stage to an outro of "We Are the Champions" by Queen.

2. Have Many Excuses to Wear a Pretty Dress Somewhere

I don't know if this is to compensate for the few high school dances I went to, or if I've seen too many Disney movies, but I always welcome excuses to put on a dress and look pretty. I got to do that very thing just last weekend, as a matter of fact. I seem to lack the everyday opportunity to wear a formal, which is why I still feel unfulfilled in this aspect of my life.

I've imagined this scenario in several ways, but it always has these three elements in common: 1) I'm wearing a pretty dress, and I look smokin'. 2) There is a big ol' staircase. and 3) There is a really cute guy waiting somewhere along the stairs. He'll give me a look that says, "I had no idea how I subconsciously felt about you before this moment, but I'm pretty sure I want to marry you based solely on how you look in formal wear." Then we consummate our love in a huge room with a pool table in it. Because pool tables are classy.

For a film parallel, think a combination between Anastasia and Titanic. Mostly Anastasia.

3. Discover I Have Magical Powers

As many children do, I had imaginary friends. Their names were Jonathan, Missy, and Lou Lou, to be exact. Occasionally others made an appearance, such as Jessica (she was snooty, wore fur coats, and she was a major beeotch) and Reflection (who, as sad as it is to admit, was my freaking reflection.)

Instead of just materializing these imaginary friends from nowhere like a normal person, I had to create an elaborate back story in my seven year-old mind. Every once in a while, I would envision myself finding a pair of slightly rainbow tinted contact lenses. This is ironic because a) contact lenses are nearly impossible to find once dropped and b) I wear glasses just to avoid contacts. Rather than thinking, 'Gross. These contacts have been sitting on the ground for who knows how long. That's unsanitary,' I would put them on. They would enable me to see an entire world of Invisible People that secretly coexist with we Visible People. They rode on top of our cars. They sat in empty chairs and slept in unattended beds. They watched us do stupid things and wanted to offer their Invisible People wisdom, but they couldn't, because no one could see them but me with the magical contact lenses.

It's a good thing this was just my imagination, because this idea creeps me out nowadays. On the bright side, Jonathan and I fell in imaginary love. I think this is how my trend of fancying guys whose names start with J (especially guys named "Jonathan") found its origins.

Analyzing my younger self now, I think this reflected a desire to feel special, to do something that my peers couldn't. I still have this desire every once in a great while, although I cope now by trying to refine my talents and strengths rather than seeing invisible people. (I'm still a slightly lost cause, though, because I still yearn for a Hogwarts acceptance letter.) However, I haven't lost the opinion that having some sort of superhuman ability would still be awesome. I'd love to be able to read minds, or read lightning fast, or shoot spaghetti lasers out of my eyeballs, or something.


Yep. You're right. This entire spiel came quite literally from playing Solitaire. Welcome to my insane membrane.

As a single person, I tease people in relationships like it's my job. Seriously. It's what I do. While it's not my job to judge anyone on what makes them happy, some couples make me shake my head disappointingly.

I suppose I break a female stereotype. For example, romantic relationships depicted in the media usually don't do it for me. * I tsk at romantic movies. I avoid romance novels like the plague. And don't even get me started on Twilight. I've questioned the legitimacy of fictional relationships so often, it's trickled into my real life perceptions as well.

* I'm not completely heartless, though. I promise. For example, my heart is still recovering from Rose/Ten in Doctor Who. Oh, how I cried! Hitler could have made a jacuzzi from my tears.

Don't get me wrong. I believe in love. I've seen examples that it exists. I think it's pretty awesome, you know, in theory. I just think finding love -- that once-in-a-lifetime love based on compatibility, selflessness, trust, and honesty -- is unlikely. It's like winning the lottery, or having a unicorn sighting. While I consider myself a romantic, I'm also a realist.

I may have become too cynical to function, however. This is when I found Love Gives Me Hope. LGMH is a collection of stories submitted by readers, which are supposed to invoke within you feelings of "hope" about "love." Pretty self explanatory.

This website follows through on its goal. Some of the stories are pretty freaking adorable and have managed to melt their way to the tootsie roll center of my tootsie pop heart. However, I would occasionally run into stories that made my brain convulse. For some of these stories, it seemed like there needed to be a spin-off site: LGMWTF.

And am I going to share some of these findings with you? Absolutely, I am.



Why this gives me WTF?:
I would have payed money and brought popcorn to hear this apology. "Baby, I'm so sorry! A hoard of cell phone imps stole my phone. You know the odd voicemails you received from me that sounded mysteriously like me having relations with another girl? Those were also the phone imps. That is their mating call."

Do these two not have Facebook accounts? There wasn't a mutual friend he could have alerted? Didn't this guy know where his girlfriend LIVES? It's hard for me to believe that there was no humanly possible way for him to have let his girlfriend know of his situation. Hire a skywriter if you have to! Just don't let your girlfriend worry!

This is discourteous at best and fishy at worst. Having a mutual understanding of life's circumstances, yet still making the effort to take time out for each other whenever possible, is one thing. Disappearing with no explanation is another entirely.

"He pulled a douche move, but he 'apologized about a million times' so all is okay again!" No. Trust is hard to rebuild once broken. It's possible to fix broken trust by making up for the mistake, and not pulling the same douche move again. That's my philosophy, anyway. I demand respect for myself. And this is why I'm going to die an old maid surrounded by cats.



Why this gives me WTF?:
Love happens at all different speeds, but this scares the bejesus out of me. Marriage is a big step, the biggest step, the stepiest of the steps. It's a decision that I think some people take too lightly.

How well do you really know a person after three months? Could I have said most, if not all, of these wonderful things about guys I've dated after three months? Yes. Should I have married them? Definitely not. The only way I could've possibly known that was by giving the relationship time. People put their best foot forward when you start dating them. When you let your heart get ahead of itself, you're in danger of missing the things you might not be able to deal with in the future.

If she still feels this way in another three months, and then another three months, power to her. Sometimes you can tell right off the bat that something is right. It's just that when it's right, it'll feel right even after the warm fuzzies of the beginning of a relationship wear off.



Why this gives me WTF?:
What the...? How is this romantic? You guys are thirteen! You're not even in high school yet! You still watch Spongebob Squarepants! You can't be engaged! I just...I can't even... Ugh. Teenagers.



Why this gives me WTF?:
You know what would have made this story really touching? If this guy wasn't such a jerkface.

Not only is this guy completely leading Girl A on, but consistently disrespecting Girl B. This isn't love. This is...teenage male. If he truly cared about either one of these girls, he would either stay loyal to the first girl or admit he has the hots for the second one. Either way, he needs to stop wasting both of their time.



Why this gives me WTF?:
Love gives me hope, but stalking doesn't. It's not a crime to miss your girlfriend when she's not around, but pull yourself together! She'll be back in a month! In the meantime, you still have the telephone. And Skype. And your hobbies. I'm assuming you still have hobbies outside of Girlfriend Infatuating, right?

I knew a guy like this once. He kept a diary exclusively about his girlfriend as well. Her name was also on a few of his inanimate objects. I couldn't help but ask if he was also working on a necklace made of locks of her hair, or how his life sized statue of her likeness built with wads of her used gum was coming along.


I would take it upon myself to build LGMWTF.com, but I may die due to repeated aneurysms. As an alternative, I may have to open Kittens Give Me Hope. The tagline? You may be single, but at least there are kittens.

I'm one of the few people that can say that they have professional experience in answering questions. (No, really! I worked at ChaCha Search Inc. for a year. My IQ may never recover from the experience.) I figured some of you would like to take advantage of my inquiry expertise. Normally you'd have to pay money for my services. Actually, no you don't. ChaCha is funded by advertising and free to use. Normally you'd have to look at ads for my services. But being a good Samaritan, I thought I would extend my skills out to my adoring readers. (All fourteen of you.)

I opened an online forum for questions. (This is just a fancy way of saying that I posted a Facebook status asking for questions, and some of my friends responded.) Now that the amount of questions pleases me, it's time for...

Whitnicism's Question Corner
[Insert Mr. Rogers-esque theme song here.]

How do I become awesome?

Luckily you asked the Regional Ambassador of Awesomeness. (Well, not really, but this should seriously be a thing.) It's fairly complicated being as awesome as I am, but here are my three most crucial tips:

1. On the Office, Dwight's favorite piece of advice from his boss was as follows: Don't be an idiot. "Changed my life," Dwight said. "Whenever I'm about to do something, I think, 'Would an idiot do that?' And if they would, I do not do that thing."

The same applies to awesome. "Be awesome." Whenever you're about to do something, think, 'Would an awesome person do that?' If they wouldn't, don't do that thing.

2. Become a Nerdfighter, since they're made of awesome rather than cells and tissue. I'm one of those.

3. Dance like a crazy person in your room by yourself to a song from Glee or a pop song from the 90's, at least once a week.

Do boys not like me because of my Harry Potter/Glee/Darren Criss/watching gay kisses obsessions?

Yeah, probably. Or at least most of them.

Yet it seems to be that everyone has a handful of quirks that make themselves think, 'Wow. It'll be really hard to find someone of the opposite genitalia that will want to come near me.' (Or the same, if that's how you roll.) It's about finding that one in a thousand person that will find these quirks endearing, rather than running for the hills. People get into relationships all the time with more serious issues than just "quirks." Toenail collectors. Kleptomaniacs. Spencer Pratt. There is love in this crazy world for everybody.

You should probably take down the Kurt and Blaine shrine in the back of your closet before you invite any boys over, however.

Do you think it will be legal someday to marry my cat?

You might as well have asked me, "Do you think it will be legal someday to marry my child?"

How do you beef up a resume?

I'm supremely employed and I have an answer to this! (That was called sarcasm. Sarcasm is something you will need to learn before reading this blog much more.)

My latest quest is to find myself employment, and I haven't had luck in that so far. If you're like me, you're trapped in the "you can't get a job without experience and you can't get experience without a job" paradox. Of course lying on a resume is prohibited, but if you need that extra umph, add jobs and employers that are impossible to get in contact with and trace back to. For example:

Occupation: Ninja
Employer: Sensei (name withheld.)
Contact Information: N/A. He lives in a hut somewhere on a cliff in China, meditating for 15 hours a day in his zen garden. He doesn't believe in phones.

OR

Occupation: FBI Agent
Employer: Federal Bureau of Investigation
Contact Information: I'd tell you, but then I'd have to kill you.

You could also add some pizazz to your resume by filling the "skills and abilities" section with a ton of flashy nouns and adjectives. Your prospective employer will be so taken in by all of the awesome words that you'll be hired for sure. Some examples are: Hyperintelligent, wizard, alive, flying, pirate, reads books, important, vast, American, sparkling, melodic, obedient, early, nutritious, Gryffindor, substantial, optimal... I could go on, really. The more words, the better. Fill pages and pages of words.

Can one simply walk into Morodor?

I'm not really sure. Let's ask Boromir.

Nope. One can't.

Do you think someday it will be possible for me to have a coffee IV?

I'm no medical expert but WOWEE I HOPE SO. I would constantly be tempted to drink my own blood, though. 'Tis a blessing and a curse.

Is it possible to love all my shoes equally?

It's not possible for me, personally, to love all of my shoes equally. I like my comfortable black flats more than the vindictive brown ones that dig painfully into the back of my heels. My brown flats are aware of my prejudice, too. I always tell them, "I wish you were more like Black Flats. Black Flats never causes any trouble." Brown Flats will probably grow up to be a whore, I've damaged her self-esteem so badly.

Perhaps it is possible, if you're a better shoe parent than I am.

How does one cope with Post Potter Depression (aka PPD)?

Be right back, sobbing.

I've been dealing with Post Potter Depression off and on for years now (during the waiting period between new books and movies.) Not only have I not managed to get a grip on that, but this new PPD is an entirely new breed. It's like the rest of my life is this vast, grey, Hogwartsless field of nothingness.

The only thing I can suggest that has helped me is denial. Wrap yourself in a warm, fuzzy, invisibility cloak of denial and stay there at all costs. Reread the Harry Potter books. When you're done, read them again. Show up to work wearing Hogwarts robes. Bring your wand everywhere (I know you have one) and use spells. Develop a British accent. Spend all night in the woods trying to trap an owl to keep as a pet and train to deliver letters for you.

Or you could just check into therapy, but that's no fun.

How crazy is it to go to a bookstore and hug books/whisper sweet nothings to them?

Not crazy at all! I've hugged people and whispered sweet nothings to them. I like most books more than most people. Therefore it should be showing affection towards people that should be questioned, not books.

How do I get that cute boy at school to like me?

I didn't have much luck in high school in the boy department, but I learned a lot via quiet observation. It seemed to me that the majority of high school aged kids haven't grown up yet, and this goes double for boys. To be in a young student relationship, you must conform to young student standards. Some rules of thumb seem to be...

1. Take your IQ. Act like you're at least half that intelligent.
2. Take your level of niceness. Divide this by 1/8th.
3. Take your normal speaking pitch and raise it about five octaves.
4. Be annoying.

For some reason, boys 15-18 go nuts over girls like this. This is why I didn't acquire any boyfriends until after I graduated.

How should I deal with my Darren [Criss] obsession?

You've asked me one of life's most difficult questions, my dear. Darren Criss is hard to defeat. He is actually a cyborg that has been created in a factory, part of a vast scientific research on how to make girls go absolutely bonkers. It also comes in handy for the government if they need to shut the internet down. Darren just releases a shirtless picture of himself. Bam! Darren broke the internet.

I don't know how to deal with a Darren obsession, myself. I'm powerless against the government. But my first suggestion is to purge yourself of friends that ask questions like this:

How can one make Darren Criss marry Angel so that I can be a bridesmaid and hook up with the best man, Joey (if he's not off with Evanna Lynch)?

They only encourage your unhealthy behavior.

By the way, Joey Richter is a cyborg, too. It all makes sense now, doesn't it?

[Insert Mr. Rogers-esque outro.]

There are times in our lives when we have experiences that change us, and we have to share them. They're filled with heart, soul, and character-building pain that shapes us into the people we are and who we will someday become.

I don't have a lot of these experiences, so I'll make due with this.

Last weekend, in the course of our family reunion, a troupe of aunts and uncles and grandchildren went to revisit an area that my mom's family had hiked every year. My life-changing incident involves how I hiked to the top of a mountain. And didn't die.

It wasn't even a mountain, really. It was steep, intimidating, and included a cave and a very important-looking series of power wires on the top. My perception on what should be considered a mountain is likely warped. Living in the Rockies, we usually throw our heads back and laugh at what people from other places consider "mountains." This hill-mountain cyborg is nothing compared to the mountains that constantly surround me.

To clear up any confusion amongst readers, for we all have different opinions of what constitutes as a mountain or not, let's just all assume whatever I climbed looked like this:



Even though it didn't.

A recurring theme in this coming-of-age tale, the point that made this "mountain" trek such a struggle for me, was not my inability to walk far. I'm awesome at walking. It's one of my many talents. Heights also don't intimidate me much. I'm not stellar with being in high places, but they're manageable.

My thing is this: I'm bathmophobic. That is not a fear of baths, although that would be very inconvenient. I'm scared of steepness. I'm not sure how to describe this, other than the fact that I'm the least sure-footed person on planet Earth. Whenever I walk down a steep slope, I subconsciously expect this to happen to me.



The caves were fairly easy to get to, by normal people standards. A trail conveniently paved the way to them. However, part of this path was too steep for my standards. I walked up with no problems, but I crab walked on the way back down. I have no shame in admitting that. (Well, maybe a little bit of shame.)

I can be an overly ambitious person. You know, when I feel like it. Regardless of that moment in the Whitney Hall of Shame,I felt like I could still make the hike to the very top of the hill-mountain lovechild. This involved a fairly extensive trail including many, many steep slopes.

I'm an idiot.

With a handful of family members, we set forth. The trail we hiked was a bit of a challenge, with inclines that hours of walking on the treadmill hadn't quite prepared me for. Do you remember the old nursery rhyme, the Bear Went Over the Mountain, where a bear had climbed up and over a mountain only to find another mountain he had to climb? I sympathized with that bear. Whenever we turned a corner, believing we were finally almost there, we found another obnoxious series of twisting and turning trails.

Then we saw it, the Grand Poobah of hills. The path leading to our very destination, the very top of the not mountain, was hardly a path at all. It was a series of rocks, hundreds of them that could break off the side and cause you to topple to your doom. It's also important for me to mention that this path was very steep. Remember, I don't like steep. Steep is bad. Very bad. The sight of it alone was enough for us to give up right then and there.

All of us except for my great Aunt Margaret. My great Aunt Margaret is in her 70's and very, very miniature. Just to give you an idea, here is an actual-size drawing.


Point being, she's elderly and frail and adorable and the last person there that would be expected to try tackling the Grand Poobah of hills. Yet she did. She stared it determinately in the face. Umbrella in hand, clad in a brightly colored floral jumpsuit, she began to climb.

My uncle Darren turned to me and said, "Look at Aunt Margaret! She's doing it! If she can do it, we can!" He began to follow her. Thinking bitter thoughts about peer pressure, I followed him.

I ended up crawling up on my hands and knees. Humans have the disadvantage of only being able to use two limbs for walking. You don't see a lot of bathmophobic mountain goats, so maybe they're onto something. It was then when I felt like I was in the climax of a movie. A movie about a girl on a family hike with a fear of slopes that she needs to conquer. (I have a feeling there isn't much of an audience for that movie.)

My hands were scratched up from climbing. I started sweating and panting, which I'm sure was ridiculously attractive. About a fourth of the way up, I sat on a rock to rest. My aunt, bringing up the rear, talks about how wonderful I was to "stop and wait" for her. I'll let her believe that. When my aunt caught up with me we walked, hand in hand (because having something sturdy to grab onto helps with my fear of slopes) the rest of the way.

The view was gorgeous, probably all the more so because I was thankful I didn't fall to my rocky doom. There was also a deer about ten yards away, who had four limbs to climb with and obviously did not share a fear of steep hills. The trail back down was easy, gorgeous, and rewarding.

And there were only a few steep areas where I had to cling onto my aunt for dear life.

Let’s start this blog entry with two truths and a lie. For those of you who have never interacted socially with anyone else before, “two truths and a lie” is when I tell…two truths and a lie. The plot twist comes when you have to guess which is the fib.

1. I’m an expert at dating.
2. I had three sets of teeth.
3. I once dislocated my kneecap by swinging my leg over a four-wheeler.

If you guessed point #1, you win! Congratulations on your common sense. Clearly that is the most outlandish out of all of the given choices! However, I decided to push myself a bit out of my comfort zone and attempt blogging about that very thing today.

Before taking anything in this entry seriously, or heeding any advice therein, I would like to note that this blog is the equivalent of Charlie Sheen writing about how to be sober.

Until recently, I had taken a hiatus from the escapades of the dating world. How long of a hiatus, you ask? Think of a point between “I’m asserting my independence” and “I’m agoraphobic.” My explanation for the break was pure apathy. I was content with being single. I was interested in dates, but if it took any more effort than a Jake Gyllenhaal look-alike’s car breaking down in front of my house, I couldn’t be bothered to find any. I simply had higher priorities.

I’ve come to the conclusion that, as awesome as fictional boyfriends are, I should consider trading in for a real model. (Sorry we had to cut our imaginary relationship so short, Peeta Mellark.) Along with this realization has come another: once again, I am going to enter social labyrinth that is dating.

For posterity, I thought I should record the phases that I personally go through when dating. I could refer to them as “the phases of dating” but I’ve accepted the fact that I’m not normal a long time ago. Making these phases seem relatable to anyone else would be false advertising.

First there is finding guys to date, or what I like to call…

1. Building the harem.

It’s at this point where qualities such as approachability, outgoingness, and the ability to create small talk would come in handy. While I have my miracle moments, I don’t have much of these traits to spare. Regardless of my societal ineptitude, I’m aware that I have an entire market of men available to me, and my brain reflects this. It’s like man shopping. As soon as this stage is reached, lasers are set to stun. Rather than two eyes I have acquired dual scanners, scoping out potential mates.

This phase starts off very idealistic. I half expect to run into someone who is obviously my ideal mate from the second we meet, as if a romantic comedy script writer is penning my life. At least half of my list could be marked off within five minutes, in my dream world. “I see you’re listening to my favorite band on your iPod,” is how my model introduction to a guy would begin. “Your shopping cart is full of spaghetti. You’re also wearing a shirt that says: ‘I’m a genuine, honest, laid back, smart, fun, sweet guy who likes kids and cats, and will watch Disney movies with you. Also, I’m not a douche.’ Let’s date!” I would be pretty convinced that I had found my dream man in five minutes, which is a big time saver compared to the months you’d have to take out of your life to make the same conclusion.

Now that I think about it, the scoping process would be much simpler if we advertised a key part of ourselves via t-shirt, something that we want the eligible public to know. It doesn’t even have to be the most prolific part of you. For example, shirts that would reel me in include:

“I like Harry Potter.”
“I give great hugs.”
“I play a musical instrument.”
“My hair is curly. See?”
“The fact that you spend a large portion of your time on the internet does not intimidate me.”
“I’m Darren Criss.”

With the inability to filter people out this way, “I’m going to find my perfect match at the grocery store” turns into “I’ll go out with this guy because he seems nice and like he wouldn’t be a serial killer.”

2. 50 First Dates

Now that my harem is built, here comes the time when I have to start interacting with these people. This is the first step into truly diving into the dating process, and it’s the most intimidating one for me. You have a few hours to convince a guy that it would benefit them to spend more of their time with you in the future. No pressure.

Even if it’s not a love connection, I think I do a pretty good job at just enjoying someone’s company and a free meal for an evening. Yet some first dates are just so…awkward. It’s like mentally shoveling through six feet of snow just to get through the night. Conversation is like running underwater; you’re putting in all of your effort, but you’re not moving very far.

“What kind of movies do you like?”
“I like the documentaries about earth worms, and whichever new action movie fad is out.”
“Oh. I haven’t seen either of those.”
“Oh?”
“Oh.”
“…”
“I’m cracking a joke.”
“Your sense of humor doesn’t register with me.”
“…”
“…”
“So, how’s the weather from three feet away?”
“Slightly more humid.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“…”

Usually the date and I come on unspoken, mutual terms not to see each other again. There are times when my tendency to make jokes in awkward situations is mistaken for charm. (Since I tend to make jokes in just about every situation, though, I can understand the mix up.)

They say that you have to sift through a lot of coal to find a diamond. After you sift for a while you should eventually find that person you make a connection with. Which brings me to phase three.

3. HOLY CRAP! ARE YOU EVEN REAL?

After a seemingly endless series of awkward or mediocre people, I find someone I truly connect with. Talking is easy. Laughing is constant. This person seems to subconsciously hit every “I really like this guy” trigger I have. It’s like he somehow acquired a collection of the best things to say on a date with me and is reading them off, one by one.

Some examples of what I may hear on this date include:

“I like that really obscure interest, too! Maybe we should like that together sometime!”
“I totally respect your space. I won’t even breathe the same oxygen as you without your permission.”
“I’m not the only one who has wondered why they don’t make band-aids in different skin colors?! Woah! You’re practically my soul mate right now!”

He’ll also tell me that my eyes are as blue as raspberry Otter Pops, or whatever guys say to girls to compliment them nowadays. It’s not like guys don’t tell girls they’re attractive on dates all the time, for whatever reason. Yet a part of me believes he isn’t reading off of a predetermined list of compliments. There is a certain genuine undertone to everything he says that you don’t run across every day.

I actually believe that he is beginning to like me, the same way I am beginning to like him. As nice as having an open, honest, and comfortable relationship is, not much can compare to the “getting to know someone you‘re starting to like“ phase. Every little molecule is tingling with the excitement, the possibilities. I haven’t had to go through the uphill climb of “learning to love this person” or “embracing their flaws.” In the grand total of five hours we have been acquainted, and in seeing all of the best sides of him, he is perfect. I don’t know which pet peeves he invokes, or how he might piss me off later. All I know is that I want to see more of him.

I am on crack. Pure, unfiltered, dating crack.

4. The Waiting

While the previous phase is obviously exciting, it’s also riddled with uncertainty. It’s not a part I do particularly well with. Seeing how things go? I have the patience of a seven year-old on Christmas Eve. Taking leaps of faith? My name is Wimpy McWimperstein.

I’m a complete weirdo in the fact that I like to have things planned out. If since birth I was given a chart containing the information on who I was going to marry, what my career was going to be like, where I would live, and how many children I would have, I would be content (because a calendar with a day-by-day schedule of the rest of your life would be a little unrealistic.)

Because life does not and will never cater to my anxieties, I just have to wait to see what it dishes out. Whether it’s waiting for a call, or waiting to find out if you feel equally interested in each other, or waiting for that piece of information that tips the scale for or against his favor. All I can do is wait. Even though I’m a fairly busy girl, it’s like this aspect of my life is put on pause. It’s the most awkward feeling ever.

In the meantime, I’m left to think of events so far. I feel like I overanalyze to the point of borderline psychosis, while others just call it being female. Girls (or at least me, because it’s not fair to drag half of the world’s population down to my level) have this uncanny ability to take this simple phrase or action spoken on the part of the guy and twist it, mold it, and grind it until it’s unrecognizable. I evaluate it into the ground.

Here is a hypothetical example of what I mean.

“I like you.”
WHAT DOES THIS MEAN? Let’s review our nouns here. Is there a store called You? A restaurant? No, not anywhere nearby. Maybe he was referring to a girl named ‘Yuh.’ Does he have a thing for Asian girls? Were there any Asians in the immediate area when he said this to me? Damn my brain for not being able to recall the Asians because that’s very important information now!
He could have meant he likes “you” as in “me,” but I don’t want to jump to any conclusions.

In my attempt to simplify the dating process (because I greatly need it simplified), and whether or not I should give the guy I’m questioning another date, I’ve made this flow chart.



These are the only concrete phases I can pinpoint before the possibilities branch out into all sorts of different directions. I could go on a few more dates with this guy and just not feel it the way I did in the beginning. I could discover something unsettling about him (like his secret kiddy porn dungeon, for example.) Or the flow chart could‘ve told me that I should eat ice cream instead, and I always take what flow charts say very seriously. Especially when ice cream is involved.

Or worse. I could end up in a relationship with this person.

I kid, even though sometimes my inner cynic rings clear. In my most bitter days, I've taken a walk by a local park. There is a house obscured by trees with no neighbors, and a bright yellow sign in the front saying boldly, “PRIVATE PROPERTY: KEEP OUT.” I see myself being that guy.

Yet there is something so enriching, maybe even worth it, about bringing someone else into your life. It’s worth the social niceties, and the counterproductive dating etiquette, and even the second guessing. I can give myself a complete life on my own, but it’s the people I share it with that make it worthwhile.

Until then, I'm going to go through this dating labyrinth and hope it doesn't drive me insane.

Tee hee. "Ample" is my second favorite way to say "a lot of." My first is "an abundance."

For the keen of eye and the none of life, you probably noticed that I haven't updated this blog in almost exactly two months. This is for the following reasons:

1. I'm in denial that there aren't actually Inspiration Fairies giving writers who behave themselves inspiration dust for writing blog entries.
2. I magically gained three followers without doing diddly squat. If I actually write something, I fear I may lose those followers.
3. Since about a week after my last entry, I've been in Texas. I've been here all spring with my sister and two-year old niece.

Lately, I've been trying to avoid dying. It's harder than it sounds.

Texas has been extremely enjoyable, but these past two weeks have been absolutely ridiculous. You know how everyone has an unfortunate bout of threat to their health? A fall here or a flu there? It seems like the Sheer Forces At Will have been attacking me at all sides with throwing ninja stars and fury. They're after me. I'm convinced. And I'm not even exaggerating (like I normally do.)

As of a little less than a week ago, this was the state of my body. I now present you the Diagram of Pain:



Some injuries are not to scale (or to appearance) due to my extreme lack of artistic ability. Besides all of that, this was what my body was like. All at the same time. Oh, me.

Now for the fun part: Telling you how it all occurred.

Let's go through it chronologically. The last time I was a normal person, we were leaving the Post Office. For me, tripping and falling is commonplace. Give me a flat field with no hills or holes, and I will find something to trip over. If I were a seeing eye dog, blind people would use me to avoid dangerous situations due to me constantly approaching them. However, I always seemed to luck out when I was carrying precious cargo (i.e., my niece.) Until that day.

All it took was an uneven area of sidewalk, thus beginning an intense battle between myself and gravity. I would normally have just accepted my fate and let myself fall, but I was carrying my niece. Those were the closest I have probably ever come to those fancy and protective "maternal instincts." At the time it was intense, but looking back on it, I'm sure it was kind of hilarious. The top of my body was teetering forward, then lurched quickly back as if to say, "Oh no you didn't, GRAVITY." I looked like a weeble wobble.

The only difference is that weebles wobble, but they don't fall down. I did.

The whole process was in slow motion, slow enough to encase my arm around my niece and accept defeat. Because I wasn't able to catch myself, the dead weight falling to the ground amplified every blow. That explains half (yes, only half) of the bruises on my knee, and every single scrape in the diagram. The arms and elbow got the worst of it. During one account, my sister proclaimed that she could see bone through the elbow. (I can't confirm or deny that statement considering I could hardly bring myself to look at it.) The most astonishing thing about it is that, even though my injuries shined threateningly red, I didn't bleed.

Luckily, my niece didn't have a scratch on her. I could feel ripped off, but I was relieved.

A little less than a week later, I took a nap during (and exceeded) my niece's because I felt tired for no reason. I also had a chilly fever, if that made any sense whatsoever. In 80 degree weather, I was wearing a jacket because I had goosebumps on my arms. I went to bed early with a jacket and slippers due to more cold oddness.

I woke up at 7:30 that morning (extremely out of character for me), feeling like a swarm of tiny men attacked my muscles with little jackhammers. I eventually lulled myself back to slumber and stayed that way until my normal time. Upon waking, I stumbled to the bathroom. In a life that I've known one thing above all else (and it's that sleep cures everything,) I was astonished to discover that I actually felt even worse. It was sometime during that realization that I...woke up.

My first thought was, 'Odd. I must have dreamed that whole thing.' That thought shut itself up when I put my hand down to help myself up and it was cold and hard. There I was, on the bathroom floor, and I didn't even have excessive drugs and alcohol use to blame. I went through a period of denial when I believed, 'I couldn't have fainted. Maybe the bathroom floor felt cool and nice and pretty and I curled up on it and slept for a little while.' That was until Knee Bruises: The Sequel came out. Even then I wasn't entirely convinced because the idea of fainting is frustratingly inconvenient. Welcome to my brain.

The only symptoms unexplained are the coughing and sore throat. That doesn't have as elaborate of a tale as the others. They were just there. For a long time. From the fall at the Post Office to the swooning in the lavatory almost a week after both incidences, there it was. The symptoms refused to subside. It's like my throat was starting to mock me and my existence. I think everyone has had an illness that they have begun to get irrationally angry at. It's an awkward feeling to wake up every morning and want to shout at your own throat.

I wasn't sure if it was allergies or weather changes, so I went on a "kissing my niece" boycott during that time. That was the last straw. I started to go a bit insane at that point. I was bitter towards the world. I would mention poverty and war in the same breath and seriousness as this sore throat. I became a soldier for health, putting myself through every obstacle, every sacrifice, and every old wife's tale to get rid of the cough once and for all.

I would also have conversations like this:

Me: I'm so sick of being sick! I'm going to beat this thing!
My sister: Geez, you're talking about it like you have cancer or something!

For the record a combination of honey, gargling salt water, and cough drops did the trick.

I wrote this entry because...well, first, because I actually think all of this is hilarious (which means I have the weirdest sense of humor ever.) Also, I want to remind you all that everything is temporary. Even the wounds from when the Post Office sidewalk beats you up, or the results of your boycotting throat. Now I can celebrate my wellness, and the fact that I don't feel like a shell of a healthy human being anymore. Hooray!

This was only a couple of weeks after the couple of months that I haven't been blogging, however. I don't know why I used these as excuses.

Today I engaged myself in such a horrible, unsavory, torturous activity that I can barely even say the word without shuddering in horror. Cleaning.

I wouldn't say that I'm a messy person, but I'm only selectively organized. My closet is organized by color, yet my bed is always unmade. My music collection is immaculate, yet there is a Smurf village among the clutter on my computer desk. This is the oxymoron that is my life.

I don't even hate cleaning, per se. My sense of accomplishment in extreme cleaning lasts me for months at a time, which is ultimately my downfall. The process is like this:

Immediately after cleaning: My room is beautiful! I'm going to keep it looking this way forever and have a world record for cleanest, most awesome room.
A couple months later: There are a few things thrown on chairs and misplaced. No biggie. My room just looks "lived in."
A few months after that: The denial period. A black hole must have eaten the remote control to my iHome because I just barely cleaned it.
Then eventually: This is getting ridiculous. I unravel myself from my cozy blanket of denial.

My previously disastrous room was brought to you by busy-ness, laziness, and lack of motivation. I have a procrastinator attitude as well: Doing little bits of work at a time is just too easy. If you load an unrealistic amount of work on yourself and manage to do it all, you are the most sensational accomplish-er of things in the entire history of the world. You are Oprah.

Not to mention whenever I clean my room, my parents act like I've won the Nobel Prize. While they usually claim that it looks like a cyclone tore up the place, my mom proudly paraded my dad around my newly polished room. If I had kept my room clean, it wouldn't have been such a big deal. The tactic is that I make my parents disappointed and lower their expectations of me to ground zero. Every once in a while I'll do these insignificant things that make me seem like Daughter of the Year. "Whitney, you're outside!" or "Whitney, you woke up before noon!" It's worked so far.

The whole process was a little intimidating, honestly. There was one moment when I found a long lost item under my bed and I was sure that a monster would grab me forcefully by the arm and drag me into the abyss. However, it was pretty neat finding things I'd long forgotten about.

My favorite of the day: Old school assignments. I never seemed to take school seriously. However, my teachers mistook my snark for actual writing talent and gave me A's.

Exhibit A, actual excerpts from a script for Little Red Riding Hood: the Musical that I wrote for Music 1010:

WOLF: You are brilliant, you devilishly wolfy self! Dressing in drag is the perfect way to get a meal. Although I suppose I could've just gone to McDonald's. But I'd better practice a little bit so as to get into character... (Clears throat.) (Old lady voice) Oh, my heavenly ginger snaps! What a mess the young folk have become! I remember when I was a little girl, we had to walk fifteen miles barefoot in the snow to the drugstore just to get a packet of spearmint gum and a yo-yo.

LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD: Hello, Grandmother!
WOLF: Hello, young (realizes he never knew her name) um...I'm sorry. I'm getting a bad case of the grandmotherly forgetfulness! (chuckles) Um...
LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD: Little Red Riding Hood?
WOLF: Oh, yes! I never would've picked out that name. You look more like a Sarah...or a Penelope...

LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD: You saved me, Axeman! Thank you! But how did you know that I was in trouble?
AXEMAN: I have no idea, actually. I guess I heard some screaming and wanted to investigate the ruckus. Not to mention my axeman senses were tingling.

NARRATOR: The three of them spent the rest of the afternoon happily munching on Little Red Riding Hood's delicious basket of goodies. The moral of the story is this: If you want dinner, go to McDonald's. Don't dress in drag.

Then there was the bill I wrote for Government. While others chose serious subjects like medicine and abortion, I wrote a bill about how the letter "W" should be recognized as the best letter of the alphabet. I made bulletproof points such as "since 'W' is the beginning letter of 'water,' we would dehydrate and die without it" and "E is the most used letter in the alphabet, and it looks kind of like a 'W' when you tilt your head to the right." Regardless, this bill was immediately rejected in fake Congress. One of my more outspoken classmates even said it was pointless. I just like to believe that I'm one of those misunderstood, offbeat, artist-y types. At least that's been my excuse since I was thirteen.

Besides, if Bert believes it, it must be true.



Bert from Sesame Street would smile upon (or at least his unibrow would smile upon) my room cleaning and W loving ways.

I immediately took my title as perverted, but I'm keeping it anyway.

My old iPod, Bubbah (yes, I'm one of those crazy people that names their possessions), died dramatically of old age a couple of weeks ago. With many scratches on his bodice and the pixels on his screen losing their luster, Bubbah passed at the age of four. (One year in iPod years is the equivalent to twenty human years. I'm going to make this a legitimate thing.)

However, this gave me the opportunity to buy a new iPod. His name is Louis.

Since Louis is not an iPhone, the non-removable "Contacts" section on the home screen looked very empty and lonely. I took it upon myself to back up all of my phone contacts. I was going to have such a detailed collection of friends' birthdays, phone numbers, and addresses, it would make the 2010 Census feel jealous. I also thought, 'I'm the most awkwardly antisocial person on Earth. This shouldn't take long at all.'

It took over two hours. It turns out I actually have a pretty decent sized collection of contacts. I'll leave "decent sized" to your interpretation to more than likely make myself seem more popular than I actually am.
I'm no social butterfly, but I wouldn't say my social life is lacking either. I have friends that like me and stuff. Why all the contacts, though? Why haven't I been compelled to talk to some of these people?

I made a graph to try to broaden my understanding.



It didn't work.

You're probably thinking, 'Oh, Whitney! Why don't you give someone in that 75% of your graph a call? They probably subconsciously want to hear from you! Spread smiles to every heart in the world, blah blah blah.' Well, Hypothetical Person, I think you underestimate my social anxiety. In my very limited experience I've gotten two types of responses from the 75% in my graph.

First, the indifferent. You'll send a text to them along the lines of, "Hey, I haven't talked to you in ages! How's your life? How's your job? How's your weather? How's your dog?" You put your phone down and move on with your life and realize -- maybe in a day, maybe in a week -- they never texted you back. Even if it takes a while, I eventually respond to every initial "Hey, it's been a while" text I receive (granted they're from people I like.) I'm just awesome. I never really got that whole "I'm going to give you my number and I'm never going to talk to you even if you try to talk to me" thing. Maybe it was actually their evil twin with a twisted sense of humor that agreed to "keep in touch" with me? That's my current theory.

Then there is the other type of person, who decides I'm their long lost best friend. It's like a trickle turning into a flood. They'll give me hourly updates on every irrelevant facet of their lives. It's like Twitter without the Twitter. In a frustrated huff you think, 'I just wanted to check and see if you were alive and still work at that one job you had. It's nice to know that your cat, Sprinkles, is going in for a neutering I guess.'

As much as my inner socialite likes to come out and try to embrace 100% of my contact book, I'm ultimately fine with my 15%. They're my friends that like me and stuff.

'Why not just delete the rest of them?' I ask myself in a schizophrenic-like fashion at nearly 1:00 in the morning. I seem to tend to save deletion for either "I hate your face and never want to talk to it again" or "Seriously, it's been five years." Whichever comes first. I think it's safe to say that everyone has that bulk of acquaintances they haven't quite trimmed off yet, those numbers they're afraid to delete for one reason or another. If this person texts me their own "Hey, it's been a while" message, I'm the horrible person that didn't give our uncultivated friendship a chance. This would lead me to either sending the "Who is this?" text that doesn't intend to hurt but always does, or I play a rousing game of "Guess who this old friend is?" Neither are very fun.

Also, what if I need their number later? What if a man walks into WalMart with a bomb strapped to his chest and shouts, "I am going to blow this place sky high unless someone has Bobby from high school's phone number!" Do you expect me to have that blood on my hands, the innocent lives that just wanted to save money and live better? I don't think so.

Or maybe this is all just my way of making myself seem more popular than I actually am. This idea is sound, considering I name my electronics.

Before I get started with the matter at hand, I'm baffled as to why my brain chooses to give me blogging inspiration at the inhuman hours in the morning. I was just about to wrap up the day when I started scribbling things down frantically in my cerebral notepad. There are quite a few uneventful minutes in my day, Brain. Why do you always so urgently have to cut into my sleeping time?

Someone may suggest jotting down ideas when I'm a little more, you know, awake. I can assure you that this does not work. See, for example, an old notepad document that I titled "blog ideas":

Reasons Why I Want a VW Beetle
Utah!
Hiccup Cures
My Brain is a Burden
How Dating Can Kill You

Do I have any idea what I'm going on about with any of these potential subjects? No. Not even a little bit. Case made.

The topic that sealed my late writing fate is Facebook, which I decided to check before going to bed. If the day involves me spending a lot of time on the internet (which, unfortunately, is every day since my job heavily involves internet usage) I end up checking this website more times than I can admit while having my dignity intact. However, checking Facebook to me is like smoking cigarettes; you get a little joy out of it in the moment and a craving is satisfied, but it's very hazardous in the long run.

I've been wondering lately why I have such an aversion to the popular social networking site known as Bookface regardless of how often I check it. This can be summed up in a basic mathematical (but this doesn't really use any numbers, so it's more like a wordmatical) formula:

social inadequacy + social anxiety (squared) x anti-social tendencies = aversion 2 FB (hardcore *)
* Maybe I would have been better at math if "hardcore" was normally used in formulas?

Explanation: I don't do well around people, people intimidate me, and that's okay because I prefer my alone time anyway. Ultimately Facebook involves people and social networking, two things I fail miserably at, which means that it baffles me to no end. I could probably share plenty of mini stories with you, but today let me tell you the tale of when I was a friend count slut.

Remember back in the days of yore of MySpace, when your friend count was tied into your value as a human being? I must have forgotten that MySpace is on its way out, now only used by people who try to make a world record of how many words they can misspell in a lifetime, and I carried this determining factor of worth to my Facebook for a minute. Maybe it's because I am a nice person under all of the layers of being so standoffish, but I add and accept anyone I ever knew by name, talked to, and who didn't annoy me completely. However, being so casual about how you befriend on Facebook only means that someone can also be casual in removing you. Easy come, easy go.

Instead of realizing that the ex Facebook friend probably thought they had an impersonal connection to their chain of friends and figured it would be fine to remove me (since neither of us talked to each other anyway), my mind ball jumped to the (not at all dramatic) conclusion of, "BAWL someone in this world hates me." I would panic a little on the inside. I would even look at other people's friend counts and compare myself to them. For someone who has such anti-social tendencies, I sometimes surprise myself how much I crave the approval of nameless and faceless people. I guess, since I am one of those people things that baffle me, I have to baffle myself as well. This bafflement (oh, hey "bafflement" is a word) includes the fact that even though friend counts don't mean near as much to me anymore, I can still tell you exactly how many Facebook friends I have. Checking the number is a habit I'm trying to break.

What probably astounded me the most is not that I lost a Facebook friend, or not that I even cared so much about it, but that I could never tell who the person was that removed me. I would pour over my friends list, wracking my brain to see who was missing, but to no avail. I gave myself cranial aneurysms over people that I didn't even notice were gone. This was a person I put little to no effort cultivating a friendship with. If I were more selective about who my Facebook friends were myself, I would probably have deleted them. One day I thought, 'Why should I care so much about a person that I really wasn't that close with to begin with?' Answer: I shouldn't. And that is when I stepped foot on the road to recovery.

The awkward factor still remains, however. Since I rarely realize who exactly deleted me, I will see their name come up somewhere and forget that that ship has sailed. When I send a request, I don't realize that I'm coming off as flailing and desperate to someone who had already deleted me. Just like a horrible image that cannot be unseen, the Facebook friend request cannot be undone. (Unless you do this. This has saved my ass from Awkwardtown on several occasions.) This more than likely leads to the person adding you again out of what they think is politeness (and is really just a beating around the bush and, ultimately, obnoxious), and then trying to sneakily re-delete you a month later. They try, and they fail, because this person is under your radar now. Your "I know you're a Facebook friend deleter" radar. I see very little point in befriending someone that you subconsciously know, whether it's in a month or in six, you are not comfortable with updating on your life and will delete anyways. I'd rather be rejected upfront.

Facebook does not alert you about deleted friends and rejected requests, even though it would prevent awkward encounters like these. The truth is that Facebook can be so impersonal that you forget that there are real people with real feelings on the other end. Before technology, the severing of a friendship involved a lot more respect. Arguably the Facebook friend deletion can be seen as a visual representation of two acquaintances that simply drifted apart, but even something as big as a break up can be done via Facebook. (Yes, that has happened to me. Twice. I have more in my arsenal as far as Facebook rants go, instead of just friend counts.)

The point is that I have an idea. Facebook should alert you of these severed ties, but in a gentle almost motherly way. Such as:

Dear Stacy,

Facebook regrets to inform you that Veronica has removed you as a Facebook friend. Don't feel too bad about it, though. You had one class with her in your junior year of high school, and you just added her to be a nice and awesome person anyway. On the bright side, this is one less person that you could run into at the supermarket and feel obligated to struggle to say things to.

Sincerely,

Mark Zuckerberg

Yes, I think Mark Zuckerberg should personally write these. What else does a 26 year-old billionaire have to do with their time?

Also, an apology letter of those hours we will never get back from checking Facebook would be appreciated.

This entry is about a month premature, but I figured I would get my cynicism out of the way so I could spend this February 14th reveling in my single awesomeness.

As a single woman, it's practically my job to mock people who are in relationships. I have all this free time that I would otherwise be using by arguing with my boyfriend. When I have my own beau, I fully expect to be ridiculed. It's the Circle of Life.

Anyone that has been single for the majority of their life can more than likely come up with more than four obnoxious couples. These just came to me at random. Now, I bestow upon you...four types of obnoxious couples!

4. Conveniently Named Couples
Pretty much names that sound too perfect together. This includes couples that you don't have to force a celebrity couples name for (i.e. "Brangelina" and "Bennifer"), alliterations, names that rhyme and, God forbid, having the same name. These couples aren't inherently obnoxious. It's the way they're presented. They're like twins, or a circus sideshow act or something. It's unnatural.

I'm sure when the people involved in the couple think about it, it's like:
"My name is Zoey. His name is Zac. Kinda cool, huh?"

Whereas in my head, I picture this:
"I'm Zoey and he's Zac, and we searched the world in all of its E's and J's and R's to find each other. We're both also unconventionally spelled, which only adds to our soul mate factor. Stare at us in wonder and bow to us in our perfectly named glory!"

This is like Nicolas Sparks is planning out and writing their lives, and it's gross. Couples with quirks appeal to me more than the seemingly perfect ones. I am much more likely to swoon over a couple named Harry and Voldemorta. They beat the odds.

3. Teenagers
I try not to be ageist, but I'm not a fan of teenagers. I didn't like being around teenagers even when I actually was one, and that includes myself. Teens are irrational creatures and preoccupy themselves with several silly things. Put a few hundred of them together, add hormones and the opposite sex, and they're just hilarious.

You're probably thinking, 'C'mon, Whitney. Don't act like you had it all figured out at 16 years old." I didn't. I was stupid. Teenagers just should not date! Arguably this time in life does have a lot to do with learning, but it's like teaching someone how to swim. You could spend weeks watching them barely hold themselves above water, or you could throw them off of a pier while shouting, "Learn or die!"

That's cruel. However, we have student drivers at sixteen. We should start making student daters, as well. They could wear a t-shirt that says "Student Dater," and a dating instructor could bark instructions at them. "No, Sarah, you are only with this guy because you think he's hot. There is no lasting potential here beyond a few weeks tops." "Robert, stop making out with her! Talk to her about Nicki Minaj or something!" "Janet, just because you have the same favorite color doesn't mean you're in love with him!"

2. The Obsessed
This happens to everyone. You have a new boyfriend, and it's awesome. You can call him multiple times a day, and he won't place a restraining order on you. You can finally change your relationship status, and you're squeeing inside. He's your favorite topic of conversation. When you go out to lunch, you want to stand on your table with a megaphone and shout, "You see that guy?! That is my boyfriend!"

For most, within a few months, this wears off. You're still happy, but the feeling has transferred from a drug induced hyperactivity to a warm comforting glow worm in your tummy. Those that never progress to this next stage only worsen to the point of being unbearable over time.

I've been both the person with the boyfriend and the single one hearing about my friend's boyfriend. As someone who has had to deal with girls who I'm sure keep locks of their guy's hair in a bottle around their neck and make dolls out of his chewing gum, I have one mission and one mission only: Don't be obnoxious. Allow myself to talk about my boyfriend, but integrate that topic with your family and work and movies and all that other stuff that actually matters in my life.

It just doesn't seem worth it when you get into a conversation like this:
Friend: My boyfriend is so cute!
Me: Awww, that's awesome! Speaking of cute, today my niece...
Friend: Last Saturday we went on a date, and when he picked me up he was wearing a green shirt. He looks so good in green!
Me: ...He must be an autumn, then. So...
Friend: Then he took me to get pizza, and it's like, how does he know I love pizza? It's like he read my mind!
Me: I think that's a safe bet. Well...
Friend: And he held my hand! But he didn't interlace his fingers with mine, so I don't know what to make of that...
Me: I have cancer!
Friend: And than after that we went to see that new Jennifer Lopez movie...
Me: You realize there's a war going on, right?

Then you go onto Facebook to talk to people without having to actually talk to people, and it's a couples frenzy. Statuses dedicated to each other. Multiple posts on each other's wall. Five profile picture changes, all of the two of you together. We get it. You're in a relationship. That's great. When you rub it into the rest of the world's faces, though? That's a little less great.

1. The Drama Llamas
This one is the doozy. Instead of thinking, 'Hey, this relationship sucks. I should get out of it,' they seem to thrive off of each other. They're constantly fighting. They're broken up and gotten back together multiple times. They hate how much they love each other and love how much they HATE each other! It's not real love unless it's difficult and passionate. Give me a break.

It's like the experiment with rats. One door electrocutes you when you touch it, while the other has cheese. Some only need to be electrocuted once to think, 'Hey. That hurt. I should go for the other door. It has cheese.' It seems to me that some want the electrocuting door to be the cheese door so badly that they're willing to zap themselves into a charred mess of defeat.

That may not sound very logical to you. That's because it's not logical. Neither is trying to talk to someone in a relationship like this:

"This is just a hunch, but your relationship with this girl isn't exactly healthy."
"But I love her! I love her!"
"Right, yeah, that many splendored thing. But do you remember that time she cheated on you with your brother? That doesn't sound very splendored to me."
"She just needed to be with that guy to show her that we're meant to be together."
"Um. Okay?"
"I'm accepting my constant heartache like a champ. If I am obsessed with her and in denial for long enough, she'll see how unshakable my love is and want to marry me. It's passionate."
"Or you could put all of that passion into something else? Like maybe a hobby? Or finding a therapist?"


Unfortunately it seems like more couples fit into the obnoxious category than the not-obnoxious category. That is what makes that one find so special. To the singles, we'll party it up in our singletude. To the healthy relationships, claps for you! And to the rest of you...go find your cheese.

I have the attention span of a pet hamster. Because of this, I love and leave writing projects like a writing whore. Hopefully this blog does not become another notch in my bedpost. That way I can send a link here to all of the important writer-y people I contact and say, "Lookie here! See?! I actually do write on a fairly regular basis!" This blog will hopefully help compensate for my tiny resume.

Also, writing is crucial to my survival. If I don't write, I die. This hasn't been confirmed, but I wouldn't want to test this theory out. I prefer myself alive.

When I write, I don't really write at all. I just talk through my fingers. The only difference is that I can actually consider things before I write them. With talking, unfortunately, you can't go back and edit it to sparkly perfection. If you could, I would be a lot less socially awkward.

Naturally, I wanted a blog name that perfectly embodies what this blog is going to be about. This was a challenge to me. I love naming things. If I had the option to name and constantly rename my future children I would, although I'm sure that would traumatize everyone involved.

My Poor Son's First Grade Teacher: "What is 2 + 2...Jimmy?"
My Poor Son: "My mom watched the Lord of the Rings movies, so I'm 'Dominic' this week."
My Poor Son's First Grade Teacher: "...."

I pondered, and I pondered, and I pondered some more. Then the perfect name came to me in an epiphany, and this is what it looked like in my brain.

Whiticism

It was personal, yet didn't simply involve my full name. (There are at least 100 people that share a name with me, so that would be moot.) It involved wordplay on "criticism," and I enjoy wordplay. I was even able to define it:

whit·i·cism - noun: A snarky sometimes witty take on the world through the eyes of someone named Whitney, who is snarky and sometimes witty.

I excitedly went online to register this name, when I discovered to my horror that it was taken. The way the person who thought up the name first defines "whiticism" is as follows:

whit·i·cism - noun: LOOK AT MY BABY!!!!

I tried to add an "s" at the end to make it "whiticisms," but this was also taken. For an extra emotional kick in the pants, this blog only has one entry...written six years ago. If I ran a blogging website, I would force those who never use their blogs to purge their awesome usernames and surrender them to those who plan to write regularly. The user who never writes would then receive a mediocre username in its place. (Examples: iusetoiletpaper, iownacomputer, puppiesarenice, or the most straightforward iamlameandneverupdate.)

This is how I compromised to "whitnicism," which sounds like "witness-ism" in my head and doesn't quite roll off the tongue the way "whiticism" does. Yet that is life. We settle for the cards we've been dealt. (At least we settle when we're too lazy to come up with a new username that hasn't already been taken.)