Rejection

My preoccupation with the goings-on in facebook land are occasionally tantamount to my granddad's obsession with daytime television. Both involve a lot of projection of our own desires, fears, and paranoias onto the lives of virtual strangers. The only difference is that the film quality is a little better on facebook. And I don't talk to it. At least not so far.

I like to think of myself as a fearless woman who couldn't give a bird's poop about what other people think of her. This is why, for example, I have no trouble saying callous, hurtful, and inappropriate things in refined social situations while I am "networking." However, I've come to realize that this pooh-poohing of others' opinions is not true, and not only because of the Tourettes diagnosis.

Yes, sadly there will always be a little part of me that will still be bitter about the day I scratched my nose a little too intensely in sixth grade and all those kids started calling me "Ms. Gilbooger" and saying that I was eating boogers and I wasn't. I mean who eats boogers when you can put them on a plywood board and threaten to touch your younger sibling with them while they're sleeping like my deranged Uncle David liked to do to my father. But whatever, those kids were stupid.

Except now all the stupid kids want to be my facebook friends, and out of a sense of munificence (brought on mostly by the fact I am a big-time attorney and their job description is "my husband is a plumber which gives me the flexibility to be a full-time mom") I have agreed to their proposals. But which unfortunately ensued in annoying little griefs that I thought I had left fah fah behind.

The first came from this bitchy cheerleader girl. I remember two very important things about this girl. The first is that she had disproportionately large calves. The second, and most important, is that she told people I had lost my virginity at a party on someone's back porch swing. That last part is not true, and in fact not even believable since most adolescents can barely get it together enough for missionary style, much less moving surfaces. Anyway, she dated an ex of mine and they pretty much both hated me, and really, the story should end there. And indeed, I had long buried it until she "friended" me.

She then offered what appeared to be the peace pipe in the form of a "message" wherein she told me I looked beautiful, that she was amazed at my travels and how she always knew that I'd be a success (?). She then offered info in the form of having kids and invited me to look at her kid photo album. Okay, so I did because I knew she was looking for me to write back and say "Hey, you're also a success because someone put a penis in your vagina and nine months later things came out that can breathe. And they're adorable!" But I looked at ol' Ray-Lynne and Dewayne and I knew that I would hate myself forever if I ever in any way praised their aesthetic value. And yet I also hated the fact that it seemed like she had really tried and yet, there I was, being all petty. So, I hemmed and hawed and then noticed about a week later that she had "defriended" me. And to add insult to injury commented on another mutual "friend's" status that "her status wasn't as witty as some show-offs we know."

Okay, this is actually pretty funny but I am so sick and tired of people who don't respect what should be the cardinal rule of facebook. If you "friend" someone, you do not get to defriend them unless that person really wrongs you in some horrible way. Like kicking your dog. Or sucking as your partner in a clinic. But really, was I chasing you down? No. You wanted me, and you don't get to decide that you don't want me anymore. Or something.

Yeah, that didn't really make much sense. What I meant to say is: Fuck you. And Ray Lynne and Dewayne. And my only regret is that I didn't make that into my witty status for that day.

The second happened a little more recently and involves a girl I may or may not know. We have mutual "friends" but she doesn't look familiar except as a girl who may or may not have been in my math class (and of that I can't be sure because I spent most of my math classes absolutely panicking at the thought that numbers would ultimately be the downfall of me getting into a good college and the hell away from this redneck town). But, whatever ... accept, accept. Then the other day I logged on to find that she had nominated me as "most likely to come on too strong."

What the fuck? I don't even remember this girl, and yet somehow my encounters with her seem to have left such an impression that 13 years later she needs to put out just how over-the-top I was. I'll admit that I had a panache for getting myself in trouble (the strip poker in the hotel with the Beta Club president comes to mind, but we were just faking it, and when he leaned out the hotel room when you stupid people knocked he was only naked from the waist up for fuck's sake). I'll admit that at times it may have appeared that I was on more drugs than I actually was on. And maybe I didn't need to be so enamoured with Tori Amos that I also dyed my hair red. But you are not allowed to friend someone who hardly deigns to know you and take advantage of their goodwill by blessing them with a superlative that makes it sound like I hang out with a cloud of aftershave engulfing those around me as I lean into their personal space and make kissing noises. Fuck you also.

Wait, maybe I don't actually care. Maybe these ruminations are more of an effort for me to get inspired to blog more often. Except now I'm convinced that a colleague hates my guts. But then again, she's the type of person that's so uptight, when she reads microwave instructions that say "make a 1" slit on the top" she probably gets out the ruler. So, I don't really care what she thinks.

Or do I? Did I mention she had the nerve to defriend me at one point? After SHE friended ME?

Duh duh DUH!!!!!