weirdness

I'm a little out of sorts. My day was odd and just swirled into discomfort.

Today I worked in Art/History, a division I rarely work and feel so unprepared to answer questions there that I cringe when people approach me. When I headed for lunch I remembered it was Media Democracy Day, which means lots of tables set up in the promenade with socially-conscious people. I mention this because on my way back to the office with my lunch, I noticed the boy with Sideshow Bob hair whom I dated badly last year. He was reading something so he either didn't see me or was pretending he didn't see me. I thought for a moment that I should go over and be polite or to see if he would squirm. But I didn't. I walked on, immediately feeling a sinking feeling in my stomach and regretting my decision.

Really, how well could a conversation go? I had an internal dialogue that volleyed between wanting to make him uncomfortable and to see if I could have a civil conversation that would make him regret having no interest in me at all.

Instead I, as usual, did nothing.

After work I went to meet up with a friend and her friends before the screening of a short film she wrote the screenplay for. People are nice, but it makes for an uncomfortable situation when you know that none of the people you're being introduced to will remember your name or you in 2 minutes. I'm not exactly sure what it is about me that prevents people from remembering meeting me after 4 or 5 introductions. I sat alone on the bus to the event, the others breaking into a couple of factions. Upon entering the venue, I saw someone from work I haven't seen for a while, so I had a chat with him while the others walked past me, not even aware I was in the group. So I decided to sit with my conversationalist and his friend. At the end of the evening, as everyone filed out, I couldn't see anyone from the original group. This was somewhat disturbing since there were 10 of them. So I assumed they left without me or something and my work friend was talking to someone in the theatre, so I decided to go home.

At the bus stop one of the people I've met various times (have even been to her house) walked right by me. Three others stood in front of me and spoke French, not even acknowledging me. Just one person waved at me when we both got on and waved at me when she and her friends got off. Those are some bad odds: only 10% of people who meet me recognise me.

I'm really trying not to take it personally, but it's challenging.

I'm also trying to avoid Facebook because I'm not really interested in discovering that my sneaking suspicions about, again, being left out of various plans this weekend are well-founded.