The Believer in The Stuff That's Not Interesting But Is The Most Interesting Stuff I'll Write

The final night of my research project ended up with my not arriving home until 4:30 in the morning. I had forgotten that the evening before Thanksgiving is the busiest night of the year for bars and clubs. That meant that my evening was overloaded as I had too much to keep track of… Especially when two cute guys walked into the bar.

I’m a big believer in names and the psychology of names. When I meet someone new who happens to have the same name as someone, I’ve learned that I psychologically compare him or her to the image I have in my head.

So it turned out that these two guys have two names with lots of… expectations attached to them. Kevin and Edgar. Kevin is my father’s name, and Edgar should need no introduction. The amusing thing is that they were very damn cute. In an effort to remain frivolous (a word not recently associated with my character), I ended up with them at a diner in the wee hours of the morning.

When I got home, I wondered why I had spent these extra hours with these two strangers. There really was no reason. A friend had offered to give me a ride home hours earlier. I desperately needed the sleep because the amount of work I have left to do is staggering. Instead I chose to eat a meal and have a random night time adventure with two men whom I shall probably never meet again.

How pathetic to trade sleep and energy for the thrill of flirting.

The Thanksgiving holiday took an interesting turn when my obnoxious roommate invited me to spend it with his family. Typically, I enjoy the solitude of the holidays, but I decided that this afforded me a rare opportunity to figure out how to dismantle a bomb.

It was interesting because I was “othered” the entire time I was with his family. Especially by his mother. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t believe she was trying to be rude (although she frequently was), she just seemed to believe that I had never met a black person before.

“Collared greens is a typical food that African-Americans consume during special occasions.”

Duh.

“Bid whist is a traditional African-American card game. Do your people have card games?”

Fucking really?

“Gospel music is a tradition in African-American culture, not anything like the music in the dry, old hymnals your people use.”

I just could not believe some of the things that came out of this woman’s mouth.

When she stated that her whole family was a New York family that originated from Harlem and the South Bronx, I broke in with my little story about my visit to Harlem when I was in New York. She asked if I had been many other places. I casually mentioned that I’ve been to 32 states as well as lived in Europe and she finally shut her trap about “my people.”

I did get to understand why my roommate is the way he is. He’s even the outcast amongst his family with many of his relatives saying extremely hurtful and negative comments. He’s the baby of the family and therefore to get attention he had to be the obnoxious one.

It’s very fascinating getting the opportunity to go inside someone’s world and explore it. It helped fill in the blanks and answer many questions I had regarding the mysterious behavior of this young man. Getting the opportunity to explore someone’s space, meet the people who shaped him and engage or interact with them is great, but being able to interpret what all of that means is different.

Anybody can go in and see and interact but to extract meaning from the situation is not easy. I don’t mean to brag but extracting meaning from communication interactions is what I have spent my time in college studying. It is the subject of my enormous study. It is what I have trained myself to do.

Find meaning.

I went out with Kevin and Edgar because I’m sad, I’m lonely and I’m desperate. Edgars and Kevins have been people that have greatly impacted my life and that’s what I was looking for. I was looking for something better than what I have now.

That means that that evening was far more important than the sleep I should have been getting because that means I had hope. Hope is the promise of sustained energy beyond the hours of sleep I missed. Energy propels me forward but hope compels me to search for the energy.

My roommate needed to get away from his family who treat him less than kind. I have impeded that goal, I have been a bad friend even though I’ve never really considered us friends.

He had hope and I am constantly interfering with that. I want no part of that any longer.