Sunday, June 10, 2012

Fighting the Flow



A teacher, an office manager, 2 physical therapists and a wanna-be walk into a bar, can you guess which one just doesn't belong?  These are a few of my friends: The professional career women, the well dressed contingent who work to make money to provide a better quality of life for their families. I'm no less driven or passionate about my need to succeed as they are, so where did I go wrong? Why do I find myself increasingly unskilled to compete on their level? Why does the divide seem so deep? Am I really destined to live merely a half-assed Life? Who's fault is it? Why can't I stop measuring my worth by the success of others?

I was actually the first to walk into the bar (in spite of my effort to be fashionably late). The staff sneered and profiled me from the get-go. I wasn't 'their type'. Fuck them! How do they know who I am? I usually avoid the place like the plague, been screwed too many times and it just ain't worth it to shell out good money to be abused by holier-than-thou hipsters, but I thought I'd give them yet another chance. As my friends arrived, the air of judgement from the staff began to reek as we table hopped a few times trying to get comfortable. The bartender didn't appreciate that and the vibe was more than unfriendly. It's a bar, get over it.

We were ridiculed for not reading the signs on tables (which looked like garbage) that explained there was no outside patio service. It was all downhill from there. Not enough ink or piercings I suspect. Oops, I forgot my ironic trucker hat -maybe then they would have been nice to me! It's a shallow shame to be sized up based on your appearance. Just because I don't wear cool shoes doesn't mean I'm square, just means I'm practical and perhaps less in debt.  Little did they know that I am actually a double agent. I don't fit in with my friends either, just infiltrating the successful class for the night . . . spying on 'the greener side'.

It sux to feel like I don't have a peer group or at least a BFF. It sux to feel like no one ever gets me and that I'm constantly vying for acceptance no matter what circle I'm in. It sux not to have come up with an external image that better reflects my internal personality by now.

Even at my friendly neighborhood Craft Night, I get the sideways looks for appearing a bit too Normal to be an artist with any real talent. But then I proceed to overcompensate by acting like a blubbering airhead just to prove that I really don't have my shit together. I just dress/act generically to transition better between the dark side to the light. It's been tough trying to live a bohemian art-filled life and still hold my own as a semi-respectable mom in the school halls and on the soccer field. In the end, I don't really succeed at either.

4 comments:

  1. Alea, we are strikingly similar in many ways. Hang in there, I'm sure it has to get easier, at least I'm hoping :)

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  2. Thank you Mama, it's reassuring to know that there are others out there who feel the same way.

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  3. You could have easily written this about me as well. I have a lot of the same issues. And just to put the record straight, YOU kick ASS...and FUCK those stupid hipsters and their overly ironic crap anyway. If they actually WERE artistic and original, they wouldn't ahve to look like moustache-ed PBR-swillin' sheep ;) (just saying...heh)

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  4. Amy -you crack me up! Thanks for your support and for putting a smile back on my face :-)

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