My Secret Vocabulary: 2011

Sunday, January 23, 2011

The Friendly-Shady

(Cell Phone vibration):

Arthur: "Wusup Jud?"
Jud: "Whatupppp? Whatchoo doin tonight?"
Arthur: "Not much; well I've gotta go to this party with a friend of mine."
Jud: "That sounds like fun. Who all is going?"
Arthur: "I'm not real sure. It just one of those thangs; you can probably come, if you want."
Jud: "I dunno; call me when yall are leaving."
Arthur: "Aight man; will do."

Do you recognize this dialogue? You should. It is something, in one form or another, we all do. This is the Friendly-Shady.

In respect to the above example, two things are obvious: 1) Jud didn't have much going on for the night and was down for whatever. 2) Arthur had plans that didn't include Jud and he meant to keep it that way. What wasn't so obvious, but is implied, is the mutual respect each of them had for both themselves and each other. Notice how the dialogue didn't go:

Jud: "Hey, what are you doing tonight?"
Arthur: "Going to a party with another friend."
Jud: "Cool. Can I come?"
Arthur: "No; you won't really know anyone there, I'm a second degree invite, you'd be a third degree invite and I don't want to have to end up babysitting you all night."
Jud: "OK. Thanks for saving me from a night full of awkward non-versations."

The conversation didn't happen like this because that isn't how we communicate; it's much too direct. Instead, we speak more like the first one as Arthur subtly conveys his shadiness in a friendly way. Had Arthur not been friends with Jud, he probably would have just lied to him about what he was doing and said that he'd call him tomorrow. Of course he'd have no intention of calling. It's just one of those things we say.

I, for one, appreciate it when someone friendly-shady's me. It's kind of like when someone cuts you off on the interstate, glances over and smiles and waves. What they're really saying is, "I'm not sorry, but I appreciate your position. No offense, but I've got to get where I'm going and that place doesn't include you."

Communication is so much more than the literal words we speak. Instead, it is an elaborate orchestra of cultural gestures that link us from our individual separation.

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...For a further look into the dynamics of "The Degrees of Invitation", visit my new Blog at www.mysecrestvocabulary.wordpress.com.

Why Blog?

Or perhaps the question is, why write?

Within each of us, there is a creative itch that longs to be scratched and writing is the way that I scratch.

But if you asked me why I want to be a writer; if you really had to freakin know, I'd tell you that no one really wants to be a writer. I'd say that I wanta change the world with a blue pen. I'd say that I'm a philosopher and a hypothetical painter and I want the Sistine Chappel and I want to depict all of life's little intricacies and be read and influence and imprint myself upon many others or, at the very least, just one person at the time. But I don't nessesarily want to be a writer.

At present, I'm a young aspiring liver, still walking just beyond the fork of that safe road that is otherwise travelled - you know, the one that is beset on all sides by security and uncomfortable shoes and collared shirts and/or neckties that are color-coded to the weather, and it's bordered by walls of spreadsheets and monday morning meetings and the company of perpetually-wrinkled forehead, gray-haired men who live in mediocre-tall houses and spend their coffee-stained-teeth lunches whisperedly dreaming of the one-day fruit of their 401k fortunes and talking about those poor young wretches who'll never know the ways that used-to-be.

But more specifically, I'm a two-sided man - coffee-stained-teeth luncher by day, Manmoth by night, and a 12-year old for at least one hour per day. But really, you see, I'm an economist right down to the souls of my shoes, and I'm an endlessly endeavoring understandinger of the seemingly endless external and internal aspects associated with all aspects of human life and in looking for the ways in which they differ and, more importantly, are alike.

In that, I guess you could say that I'm an altruist and that's what interests me and, at the very least, I have my philosophical question - "What is Good?"

But enough of the present this rant and these blogs are about a aspiration for a greater life.

In short, money, more college, travel and writing, good times, fun, publish book(s), make one of 'em into a movie, more college, teach, charity, love, experience, passion, growth, pursue interests and learning. The only real order of which is the money and the college, each of which are pivotal to the attainment of the rest.

But why blog?

I blog because I'm not yet a published writer and it feels good to put oneself out there, butt ass naked and vulnerable to the whole world and, in short, be read.

But then, why write?

To change the world with words appease my curiosity at the same time. One day, once I've written about twenty-seven best sellers at least four hundred and thirty articles and I feel like I've mused on all there is to muse, I don't know what I'll do to scratch this itch that doesn't seem to ever attain satisfaction. At that point, I guess I'll have to learn to spell or paint or play the guitar or maybe then it'll be about time to roll over and die. (For more vocabulary, visit www.mysecretvocabulary.wordpress.com )