I'm haunted by my past in the stupidest way imaginable.
Today, while in the shower, I remembered going to an amusement park near Salt Lake. I was very young and slightly scared to go on the "scary" ride called "Dracula's Castle". You sit in a little car and it slowly drives you by scary mannequins in various sinister poses. Coffins open slightly and spiders drop from the ceiling as you go by. I'm sure you have been on a ride like that. Well, when you first go though the door to get on the ride, there is an attendant that tries to scare you and sometimes push your car (I guess it gets stuck at the start sometimes). I thought I would be real clever and when the attendant started to push my car, I said, "Ahhh, I'm not your blood type!" What a dork!
So, now I'm in the shower in current times and I'm just thinking about what an idiot I am for making that stupid joke when I was probably only 12 years old. I'm always thinking about that. It just slows me down. I don't learn either. Today, even after my shower of shame, I made a stupid joke when getting change for a twenty. I said, "could I get 3 fives, and 5 ones...and 2 tens, and a fifty". God, I'm still a dork. I've even made that stupid joke before. Do I have an illness? I bet everyone does that when getting change. I would get so sick of that same joke told to me over and over. In fact, I do get sick of jokes told to dealers. Whenever the cut card comes, someone always says, "is that a wild card?" I laugh politely unless I don't like them.
What really gets me (now this is a tangent), is when people tell me stories of other people betting large amounts of money. They say it as to impress me. Who do they think they are talking to? Someone that doesn't deal everyday? They expect me to be shocked when they say that someone was betting $500 a hand and lost $10,000. I never tell them that I've dealt to someone at $25,000 a hand and they lost a million dollars.
Back to my shame, I remember when I was growing up, that if I said something dorky, I would hear it over and over again in my mind with the exact inflection as it was said. This was especialy true if it was quiet and nobody said anything after a vomited dork all over the place.
I guess there are worse things than being a dork, but why must it haunt me so?
I will replay dorky, moderately dorky, or even just obliquely dorky comments in my head. I also get hung up on stuff that I say that isn't dorky, but then I think about it and realize, "oh, so and so could have taken that the wrong way!" ... for example, I said to a older woman client, "that shade of pink looks so nice on you!" and then I kicked myself because I thought, "you're suggesting that she's old ... you know as well as she does that old women wear that shade of pink when they don't want to look sallow and washed out ..." etc. And then I'll obsess about the fact that I might have offended her by complimenting the shade of pink she was wearing. It's overthinking. It's either a form of social anxiety disorder or just plain ol' retardation, I don't know what.
ReplyDeleteM
Overthinking is the best!
ReplyDeleteThis entry is supremely satisfying to me... I have had this happen so much, and it's like my mind keeps collecting these times to replay as it goes along without ever letting any of them go. Notably, these moments of shame happen quite often in the shower for me too! I compulsively say something under my breath when it happens... like, "go away" or "leave me alone."
ReplyDeleteI feel better at realizing that the stuff you and I tend to be berating ourselves over repeatedly is all very forgivable stuff. So, you were a dork in front of some Carnie? So, I might have appeared clueless to a few girls at a 6th grade slumber party... so why do we have to care now?
Indeed, but we still do it, don't we?
ReplyDeleteI don't care about that incident now, but for a second, I feel ashamed. I was 12, not only that, I was a completely different person then too. It's like I'm ashamed of what someone else has done.
Indeed, but we still do it, don't we?
ReplyDeleteI don't care about that incident now, but for a second, I feel ashamed. I was 12, not only that, I was a completely different person then too. It's like I'm ashamed of what someone else has done.
This entry is supremely satisfying to me... I have had this happen so much, and it's like my mind keeps collecting these times to replay as it goes along without ever letting any of them go. Notably, these moments of shame happen quite often in the shower for me too! I compulsively say something under my breath when it happens... like, "go away" or "leave me alone."
ReplyDeleteI feel better at realizing that the stuff you and I tend to be berating ourselves over repeatedly is all very forgivable stuff. So, you were a dork in front of some Carnie? So, I might have appeared clueless to a few girls at a 6th grade slumber party... so why do we have to care now?