November 17, 2004

  • Why bother with logic…

    Sometimes I like to ask random questions, because certain conversaions need a lot of stimulation to keep the thread going. Mingling at a party with people you hardly know leads to strained and overtaxed subjects (which is why what’s your major and what do you do always come up (I switched it up and asked people to tell me two majors they could have been but were not and to give me three chances to guess, and then vice versa for them. You should try it, it’s a load more fun than just saying, Philosophy, that’s great)).

    Really easy ones in a party situation relate to sex. How many people will have sex because of this party? Usually under 10%. What about hook up (a much looser def.)? id say at most 20%.

    But shit can always get crazy. Who has had the most sex ever, a man or a woman? I think a woman. And how much sex was it? Like a couple times everyday for years. Probably a prostitute. How many people are having sex right now, in new york city, usa, or the world? 438, 2,000, 350,000.

    And then you can just go for current events with a bizarre tie in. Most recently I used if you could right in any televisions character ever for president who would it be? Oprah won with 4 votes. Homer and Lisa simpson both had 2. Maguyver got one. Bill Cosby. Abe Vegodah. Both characters from scrubs. Agent Cooper. It was a great run. And I am forgetting many good calls.

    I just want to engage, to get both people talking. I can always think of one more thing to ask. And its fun to muse about curious subjects that really have no answer (which means any answer is as good as the next), getting people to warm out of their shell.

    Because anytime you are not hanging out with just yourself, it’s a performance. So it can be hard, to try to seem charming and amusing all the time, on cue. Just ask questions, I say.

    But more on the stage that is social interaction. The self you are in front of your parents differs greatly from the self in front of your friends. They way you speak, your entire mien (another favorite word) changes in a group of people who are all of your sex compared to a mixed scene. And I feel that holds true with any generalizing division: race, religion, sexual orientation, class, work rank. We are a self cultivated to fit in many facets, easily permeating into each other, a chameleon trick, protean, dare I say, infinite?

    Who are you really? The person you are in front of your boss, your significant other, your best friend, your family? All of the above, really, but I wonder how telling the slight differences between all those ‘roles’ are. What won’t you say to your friends, but will easily share with your sister?

    And how does each performance reflect the stamp that living in society has placed upon you. When I act like a ‘man’ is it specifically male, or what this society has engrained me to thick as traits a ‘man’ should have. How much of me is me because I speak English (or Spanish too in my case).

    Life can seem so simple one minute. Hungry? Eat. Horny? Fuck. Tired? Sleep. Money? Work.

    And yet it can seem never endingly complicated as well, every little nuance an encyclopedia of its own.