I think I’ve stumbled into a new way to describe my kind of
person.
When I was a child, I knew specifically what I did or didn’t like. I ate the same foods over and over. I watched specific kinds of movies and shows. My toys had to be arranged in a certain way. The videogames I played had to pan out a specific way or risk being reset. It’s a kind of confidence and certainty. It may have sprung up from an offshoot of obsessive-compulsiveness.
When I was a child, I knew specifically what I did or didn’t like. I ate the same foods over and over. I watched specific kinds of movies and shows. My toys had to be arranged in a certain way. The videogames I played had to pan out a specific way or risk being reset. It’s a kind of confidence and certainty. It may have sprung up from an offshoot of obsessive-compulsiveness.
I’ve also been very slow to change. The personality traits
that had me locked into thinking there was a “just and proper” way to go about
my affairs didn’t start unraveling for a very long time. While you were
underage drinking, I took pride in being the adult and moderating the music
noise level. While the whole group wants to get Chinese food, I’d break off and
pick up a burger and meet you a few minutes late.
I applied it to my interactions with people, and certainly to a large extent still do. Either you’re someone I get along with (or perhaps was trying to hook up with) or you’re a stupid pawn to be played with, annoyed, or set to some other dehumanizing endeavor. When I decided to have “friends” the slurry of blogs trying to account for the totality of what the word would mean sprung forth.
If you didn’t know, one thing I used to do as a kid was write down animal names. I got it in my head that I liked animals so I wanted to know what all of them were. I’d go through all my school books, magazines, calendars (What? Oh right, pre-internet), and eventually encyclopedias because more people than you think had a collection of them. I can’t count how many notebooks I filled with every inch of each page inked. If I wasn’t positive I had already written a name down I figured better safe to have it twice than not at all.
Then one day, in the middle of an encyclopedia, I abruptly stopped. It hit me that I was never going to collect them all. I’d never bothered to ask the stupid question “why” was I collecting these names. I wanted them. It wouldn’t have even been proper to call it “an interest in animals.” I was hooked on owning and experiencing all the names. It’s the same compulsion that made me turn in a report on Texas with a list of every city in Texas, despite my teacher telling me not to, because I couldn’t wrap my head around how you understand or want to hear about a state if you don’t even include the cities!
It was all or nothing. My teacher was either going to take everything I had to offer or I wasn’t going to accept her irrational lower grade for not following her instructions. I had to pursue every animal or why should I think you’re going to believe me when I have something to say about them? (One smart-ass friend of my parents doubted I had every bird in some book they showed me so I spent the rest of the night there copying them just to spite her.)
Do I have any idea where it came from? Not really. Does it likely mirror someone else’s odd psychological condition as a child? Almost certainly. What sticks out to me though is how much of it I still feel today and how it characterizes what I choose to do or work on. I’ve spent 2 thousand dollars so far on a tool to account for ALL of the articles and books I might read to make compelling arguments and stories. I read every Guardians of the Galaxy comic before I saw the movie. (Which I don’t suggest you do.) I completed every IMDB top 250 movie and have set my sights on 1001 movies to see before you die. Even with shitty TV shows I find myself compelled to see every episode if I started it so I can get the full, rounded, and proper perspective on it.
It characterizes my relationships. We’re either equitable intelligent and confident friends or you’re livestock. We’re either honest with each other, or I’d rather be alone. It has me thinking considerably harder about what levels it is or isn’t healthy to have, what some might refer to as, “standards” for interaction. I hate small talk, so I don’t do many if any small gatherings with new people if we’re not getting drunk. Hell, with alcohol! If you’re at a party not getting drunk, what the hell are you doing at the party!? Ride or die or stay the hell home. Mom can have a night out at the Lucky’s food court if she doesn’t want to run around naked and puke in the hedges.
I applied it to my interactions with people, and certainly to a large extent still do. Either you’re someone I get along with (or perhaps was trying to hook up with) or you’re a stupid pawn to be played with, annoyed, or set to some other dehumanizing endeavor. When I decided to have “friends” the slurry of blogs trying to account for the totality of what the word would mean sprung forth.
If you didn’t know, one thing I used to do as a kid was write down animal names. I got it in my head that I liked animals so I wanted to know what all of them were. I’d go through all my school books, magazines, calendars (What? Oh right, pre-internet), and eventually encyclopedias because more people than you think had a collection of them. I can’t count how many notebooks I filled with every inch of each page inked. If I wasn’t positive I had already written a name down I figured better safe to have it twice than not at all.
Then one day, in the middle of an encyclopedia, I abruptly stopped. It hit me that I was never going to collect them all. I’d never bothered to ask the stupid question “why” was I collecting these names. I wanted them. It wouldn’t have even been proper to call it “an interest in animals.” I was hooked on owning and experiencing all the names. It’s the same compulsion that made me turn in a report on Texas with a list of every city in Texas, despite my teacher telling me not to, because I couldn’t wrap my head around how you understand or want to hear about a state if you don’t even include the cities!
It was all or nothing. My teacher was either going to take everything I had to offer or I wasn’t going to accept her irrational lower grade for not following her instructions. I had to pursue every animal or why should I think you’re going to believe me when I have something to say about them? (One smart-ass friend of my parents doubted I had every bird in some book they showed me so I spent the rest of the night there copying them just to spite her.)
Do I have any idea where it came from? Not really. Does it likely mirror someone else’s odd psychological condition as a child? Almost certainly. What sticks out to me though is how much of it I still feel today and how it characterizes what I choose to do or work on. I’ve spent 2 thousand dollars so far on a tool to account for ALL of the articles and books I might read to make compelling arguments and stories. I read every Guardians of the Galaxy comic before I saw the movie. (Which I don’t suggest you do.) I completed every IMDB top 250 movie and have set my sights on 1001 movies to see before you die. Even with shitty TV shows I find myself compelled to see every episode if I started it so I can get the full, rounded, and proper perspective on it.
It characterizes my relationships. We’re either equitable intelligent and confident friends or you’re livestock. We’re either honest with each other, or I’d rather be alone. It has me thinking considerably harder about what levels it is or isn’t healthy to have, what some might refer to as, “standards” for interaction. I hate small talk, so I don’t do many if any small gatherings with new people if we’re not getting drunk. Hell, with alcohol! If you’re at a party not getting drunk, what the hell are you doing at the party!? Ride or die or stay the hell home. Mom can have a night out at the Lucky’s food court if she doesn’t want to run around naked and puke in the hedges.
If you tell me you’re into human rights and journalism 2
days after Nelson Mandela dies and you can’t opine on apartheid or how you want
to approach your stories (true story) I don’t believe anything about you. If
you tell me you’re into videogames and are “pretty good” at Halo and you’ve
spent 15 hours a day on it for the last 10 years, why aren’t you trying to be
the best in the world!? You cook? BE THE
BEST COOK, KNOW ALL THE RECIPES. You’re a fan of some actor or director and
have only seen 2 of their movies? You love to read and everything you list
comes off a high school required reading list? (I read every book on my 7th
grade reading list at least.) Where’s the push to do more, do it all, or be the
best? Where’s your soul clambering to get through and connect with something
that sparked your interest?
You don’t see many people whole-assing it. Or they do it in spurts for something like a Halloween costume or DIY project they know will make it to the top of reddit for a day. Or maybe they’re king of the office or queen of the novelty and niche forum. My step-mom crafts, for example. But that’s cheapening it. She sees something someone else has done and makes money off of and she wants to figure out how. You make flowers out of melted down records? Who cares if she can make perfect crocheted dolls that fetch a nice price, awesome jewelry, tapestries, scrapbooking things and so on, she wants that skill too, and then the next thing. An aside, my excitement at an opportunity to invest in and help cultivate that proclivity was recently thrown in my face (not by her).
There’s a plain of existence you can inhabit that just expects more. The dialogue should take weeks or strive to be so explicit people get confused by the accuracy. The reading might take months. The perspective should be yours and contain more than, “It was good, I thought the characters were cool and funny,” “It was just a suggestion; I don’t konw where it came from, but I guess there it is.” What you’re doing in life can be so broadly comprehensive you can make a case for the moral realignment of society. Your effort and dedication can be a source of inspiration to create and reflect and stand for something real. Or, you can tread water. You can make the excuse, and call where you are “comfortable.” When you allow yourself the responsibility to oversee exponentially increasing implications, I can take a day off from thinking everything’s my fault!
For me, it genuinely helps in getting through problems and deciding who or what I want in my life. Relationship a lie? No use pining the illusion. 1 in 5 of your friends always or merely talking about living sustainably? Better pay what it costs to actually secure the land. Concerned about communication and whether people can even recognize what’s worth respecting and talking about? Opine, share, and reply precisely when provoked and pursue diatribes like these as a form of dress-rehearsal. I’m either giving you all of what I feel or think or I haven’t given you a damn thing. I’ve just shuffled information along like a brain dead zombie because it was incidentally infectious.
Don’t be zombies, people. When I get my house in order and send out the invites 6 months in advance to party and offer to pay for your gas or plane ticket to rob you of any and all excuses, I’m gonna know when you’re too old or bland or dead for me. I won’t be rude and keep inviting you, essentially shoving my energy and expectations down your throat. But I will have a little memorial for what you once were and what was so great about it. I don’t want to learn how to interact with college kids again to find anyone with hope or time. I don’t want people dragging their feet through my life like they do theirs.
So, my kind of person is one that recognizes when and why they’re uncompromising so they can spend the rest of the time pursuing an avenue genuinely and exhaustively. They’ve searched and thought long and hard for examples of what celebrates and extends who they are. They respect all that they can mean to someone else and all the different sources of inspiration and creativity that helped comprise them. Otherwise, you’re the arbitrary compulsion or an insatiable hole. Nothing that will speak to anything I care to hear.
You don’t see many people whole-assing it. Or they do it in spurts for something like a Halloween costume or DIY project they know will make it to the top of reddit for a day. Or maybe they’re king of the office or queen of the novelty and niche forum. My step-mom crafts, for example. But that’s cheapening it. She sees something someone else has done and makes money off of and she wants to figure out how. You make flowers out of melted down records? Who cares if she can make perfect crocheted dolls that fetch a nice price, awesome jewelry, tapestries, scrapbooking things and so on, she wants that skill too, and then the next thing. An aside, my excitement at an opportunity to invest in and help cultivate that proclivity was recently thrown in my face (not by her).
There’s a plain of existence you can inhabit that just expects more. The dialogue should take weeks or strive to be so explicit people get confused by the accuracy. The reading might take months. The perspective should be yours and contain more than, “It was good, I thought the characters were cool and funny,” “It was just a suggestion; I don’t konw where it came from, but I guess there it is.” What you’re doing in life can be so broadly comprehensive you can make a case for the moral realignment of society. Your effort and dedication can be a source of inspiration to create and reflect and stand for something real. Or, you can tread water. You can make the excuse, and call where you are “comfortable.” When you allow yourself the responsibility to oversee exponentially increasing implications, I can take a day off from thinking everything’s my fault!
For me, it genuinely helps in getting through problems and deciding who or what I want in my life. Relationship a lie? No use pining the illusion. 1 in 5 of your friends always or merely talking about living sustainably? Better pay what it costs to actually secure the land. Concerned about communication and whether people can even recognize what’s worth respecting and talking about? Opine, share, and reply precisely when provoked and pursue diatribes like these as a form of dress-rehearsal. I’m either giving you all of what I feel or think or I haven’t given you a damn thing. I’ve just shuffled information along like a brain dead zombie because it was incidentally infectious.
Don’t be zombies, people. When I get my house in order and send out the invites 6 months in advance to party and offer to pay for your gas or plane ticket to rob you of any and all excuses, I’m gonna know when you’re too old or bland or dead for me. I won’t be rude and keep inviting you, essentially shoving my energy and expectations down your throat. But I will have a little memorial for what you once were and what was so great about it. I don’t want to learn how to interact with college kids again to find anyone with hope or time. I don’t want people dragging their feet through my life like they do theirs.
So, my kind of person is one that recognizes when and why they’re uncompromising so they can spend the rest of the time pursuing an avenue genuinely and exhaustively. They’ve searched and thought long and hard for examples of what celebrates and extends who they are. They respect all that they can mean to someone else and all the different sources of inspiration and creativity that helped comprise them. Otherwise, you’re the arbitrary compulsion or an insatiable hole. Nothing that will speak to anything I care to hear.
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