I have always enjoyed meeting new people. I find other peoples interests, opinions, beliefs, favorite sports teams and overall lives fascinating. What I do not care for is awkward encounters with strangers who disconcert me. For example, as I was walking from one end of campus to the other on crutches someone who I had never met or even seen before asked if I was ok. I was wary of this young man immediately seeing as how I didn't know who he was and his reason for beginning a conversation with me was sketchy at best. The physical context was awkward as I was attempting to make my way through a crowd of people and I was immediately repulsed by the young man due to the lack of sincerity in his voice. As an individual he seemed fake, perhaps my misconstrued interpretation of insecurity. He followed me across campus, just so that he could open the door for me, and all I could think about was how much I didn't want to be in the situation and how much he was embarrassing himself. Conversation was strained due to his constant self-depreciation, and I was running out of ways to make him feel ok about who he was as a person. I don't know if he was genuinely concerned about my well being, if it was his attempt at making a friend or his attempt at flirting, but in any case he needs to come up with some new tactics. Altogether, the physical, psychological, and social contexts proved to have a huge impact on the way I viewed my encounter with this young man and the young man himself.
No comments:
Post a Comment