cool 101

Now before you jump to conclusions, this is decidedly NOT an intro to how to be cool. You won’t find any glorious tidbits on how to be casual and loose. Believe me when I say I wish you would. But it’s just not gonna happen.
I figure it’s time to start letting out some of the warts. If you’ve been reading this diary for a bit, you’ll notice I try to keep the majority of my warts to myself, assuming that few people would want to read about my neuroses and failings. But, hey, it’s a diary. And after two months or so, I’m feeling a little like we’ve been dating for a while and it’s okay to let you know I fart (see Ally McBeal confession).
Metaphorically speaking.
Truth is, with the men I know and/or date, I can generally speaking be as cool and collected as I want. I tend not to get those “he didn’t call me” or “he’s really gonna hurt me so it’s time to pull out the poker face” neuroses. I’m pretty patient and pretty understanding and not looking for hidden meanings or any of that other girly shit.
That is, unless the guy really starts to mean something to me.
Enter the fart (try and stick with the metaphor here).
Today en route to work, the elevator doors opened and it was him.
You know the “him” (read: the Muse). Every woman has had a “him” in their life. The one whose story always begins with “There’s this guy…”.
Anyways, my behavior around this guy tends to be quixotic at best. Some days I’m all girly and loopy and soft smiles. Other days I’m “playin’ it cool”, a little offhand, not willing to give him the satisfaction of knowing he’s getting to me. And my degree of “cool” is always in direct correlation to how vulnerable I’m feeling that day about the whole thing.
Today, feeling a little vulnerable, the “cool” behavior came out. I swear to God I do not plan this stuff.Sigh.
It’s not a game. Honestly. It’s more like those lizards that change color when a predator is near – they change out of self-preservation. That’s me. One little psychotic lizard.
Of course, the real kick is that I don’t know how to act cool around this guy. So my “cool” ends up coming out something along the lines of offensive. Ugh. And double ugh to the having to make amends for my psychotic farting lizard behavior.
At 29, I should be able to do better than this. If it wasn’t for other women like the Editrix, I’d be convinced that I and I alone am suffering from some rare and incurable psychological disease. But apparently it’s a gender thing.
I’ll work on it, and let you know how it turns out.