Do you feel comfortable wherever you go?
I've lived in this sunny little town for nearly two years now, and still feel like I'm lurking on the edges. The neighborhood is packed with people who are either much older or much younger than myself, so whenever I am spending time in a public place--the farmer's market, the coffee-shop--and see people who appear to be close to my age, I want to go up to them and ask them what they do with themselves all the time. Why haven't I seen them before?
And so last weekend X and I were spending the evening at Scotty's, a very homey sort of place, a bit like a recreation room at your friend's parents' house. You can play darts or pinball or pool; you can drink beer and feed money into the reasonably good jukebox; but mind your Ps and Qs, or the bartender will walk by, empty your ashtray, and remind you to take your shoes off the chair, honey, because "this isn't that kind of place."
Scotty's is a magnet for people who look like they've probably seen The Matrix fifty times, people who like to talk really loudly about everything, from strange Chinese strategy games to outfitting an automobile so it won't sink when launched on to a body of water. Not necessarily the sort of person I'm dying to spend a great deal of time with, but it beats the khakis-and-blue-shirt crowd, hands down.
And every time I spend any time there, I find myself wondering who these people are. Do they live with their parents? This is suburbia, after all, and the bar is in a strip mall; it's not the sort of place you would just wander into. These people are not popping in after the Fugazi show gets out. Are these hipsters really professionals who like to dress entirely in black and play a nice game of darts at the end of a long day?
I know, I know, I learned a while back that an interesting looking person is not necessarily interesting to be around, but still: I enjoy watching them parade around and I enjoy eavesdropping on their conversations and I admire their interesting pants and little grandfather-caps and clever shoes.
I kept thinking to myself, "These people are pretty interesting. They're cool. Why don't I know any of these people?" as though I myself am some kind of techie, or a person who has really clever shoes, or a person who knows everything there is to know about Japanese samurai. I keep wondering why these cool people don't know about me, as though I am up to their kind of cool.
Who do I think I am, anyway?