Some Letters I've Been Meaning to Write

Dear Dude Outside the Shady Bar:

While it is no doubt flattering that you felt the need to stop me as I was walking home from work and make me take my earphones out just so you could tell me about how gorgeous you thought I was, this sort of talk will not make me drop my panties on the sidewalk and fall into your arms. I’m not sure what you thought you were accomplishing. I’m also not sure why you thought it was okay to be completely bombed at five o’clock in the afternoon on a Monday. It clearly instilled in you the false sense of confidence you may or may not have been going for, but such behavior in no way increases your chances of “hitting that.”

What’s more, the shady bar outside of which you were standing is probably the only place in my neighborhood I’m afraid of. It’s nothing against you personally; I just don’t make it a habit of meeting guys at bars that have no sign out front, peeling paint, fogged windows, and a front door that stays locked unless you know how to get in. In fact, I normally avoid that street corner altogether (you and your friends do an awful lot of shouting out there), but I happened to take a different bus home that day, and I had to walk by it/you on the way home to my apartment. Where I live with my boyfriend.

In summary, sir, I recognize and respect that you did your best to bring class to the situation by using the words “gorgeous” and “beautiful” instead of “hot,” “sexy,” or any form of the word “daaaaamn.” I especially appreciated the part where you told me that I was so beautiful, you’d do anything even just to be my friend. Somehow, though, I think that might not be completely true, and though your words were classy, the situation was not.

P.S. You may want to apologize to your extremely embarrassed friend who was with you at the time as well.

Dear Fifteen-Year-Old Walking With Your Friends:

First off, telling me you’re seventeen doesn’t make me any more likely to go out with you than I would be if you told me the much younger truth about your age. Come back to me when you think you can pull of telling people you’re at least twenty-one.

Now that that’s out of the way, I want to tell you that I recognize the amount of balls it must have taken to leave the group of friends with whom you were walking the opposite way down the street from me, turn around, cross the street, and approach me. But if you’re going to go through all that, you should at least have prepared a better opening line than “What’s yo name?” (I lied, by the way: my name isn’t Laura. Sorry, but you very randomly approached me on that stretch of South Street that’s kind of shady and has no street lights, so I was a little worried.) I must admit, the rest of your scripted conversation material was above average: telling me you go to Drexel and then engaging me in an academic discussion is, I admit, a better route to my heart than most.

But I need to explain something to you. I understand if you don’t know this rule. You’ve only just begun to play the game. You just need to know that when you ask someone out and she turns you down with any form of the words “I have a boyfriend,” that should be the end of it. Telling me “it’s okay, we can just be friends. Doesn’t your boyfriend let you have friends that are guys?” is not even a little bit convincing, and you’re just forcing me to turn you down over and over, which has got to hurt you more than it helps.

I guess it was just that you really didn’t want to return your group of friends with nothing but rejection, especially because I’m sure that just before you approached me, your parting words to them were “Watch me score this chick” (or some updated, non-90s form of that phrase). I do admire your confidence, your determination, and your unwillingness to take no for an answer; however, these are not qualities I find attractive in a mate. Tone it down a little, slugger. Tone it down.

Dear Drunken Man in the Subway:

As with the others, I’ll admit I really was flattered by your taking notice of me. I also want to commend you on your bold, unchecked confidence. Most creeps won’t go beyond turning around to get a glimpse of a woman’s ass as she passes him on the sidewalk. But you, my friend, went above and beyond what was expected of you. My cheeks must have been bouncing up and down merrily as I ran to catch the train, and when I didn’t make it in time you must have been over the moon. My choice to sit down on the bench while I waited for the next train was unfortunate for you, however, because it hid my backside from your view. But you weren’t ready to give up on it.

I know you really thought that you were covert when you sat down next to me on the bench and slowly scooted your way closer to me. Maybe you even thought I didn’t notice the first time I bent down to put my umbrella on the ground, and you leaned back to get a glimpse of the top few inches of my butt. Or maybe you just didn’t care if I noticed. Because after your first reward, you slid even closer, and when I was stupid enough to bend over again to put my drink on the floor, you let out an elated “Hoooo! You got a NICE ass fo’ a white girl!” which I think was a combination of your attempt at a compliment, and your complete inability to censor your own thoughts at this stage in your inebriation. And really, whenever a black man takes notice of my ass (which I’ve never thought of as “nice,” even “for a white girl”), I do feel a pinch of pride. So if this was what you were trying to do—make me feel better after I missed the subway train—then you succeeded.

Where you lost me was when you continued to make comments, even after I learned to stop bending down and simply remained seated on the bench and you had absolutely no way of seeing the thing on which you were commenting. Your compliments lost their credibility then, and I wondered what exactly you were picturing situated between my torso and the subway station bench. Was it something out of a Jay-Z music video? Something firm and bouncy? Because I, as well as everyone else in that subway station, knew this to be a delusion of grandeur. Eventually you, too, must have realized that your dreams were a little too unattainable, because when a couple of beautiful ladies whose rears better fit your fantasy descended the stairway, you left my side to pursue bigger and better butts. I hope you’re as confident sober as you are drunk, my friend, because that sort of pride in yourself can really take you places.

What Really Is In A Name

I saw this ad while riding the bus home the other day:

(click to enlarge)

Yes, that’s right. There’s an attorney in Philly named Justin Bieber, and he’s advertising himself like that’s not weird. Good luck getting taken seriously in a courtroom, buddy.

I mean, I kind of feel bad for the guy. I’m guessing he was born, named, entered law school, and maybe even passed the bar before the singer rose to fame. It’s not like he chose this profession knowing the potential consequences. It’s just an unfortunate coincidence, and now he has to suffer through the agony of trying to practice law with the same name as a floppy-haired teenage heartthrob.

If I were the lawyer, I’d definitely either change my name or go by something else- a middle name, perhaps. But apparently, this guy doesn’t agree. He’s flaunting his given name loudly and proudly.

I’m willing to bet he’s actually promoting the name association. I mean, it’s extremely unlikely that he is unaware of it. Everyone’s at least heard of Justin Bieber the singer by now. People probably point out the happenstance to him all the time. But this wank-job is bold enough to display his name on his posters, and slap those posters all over Septa buses. The name itself will make it difficult enough for the guy to seem legitimate; plastering it all over the city like it’s clever makes it that much worse.

What this really got me thinking about, though, is the way your name defines you in general. Studies that I won’t cite here have proven that people with regular, more common names like Mary are more likely to be college educated and wealthy than people with other, less “normal” names that are more commonly associated with poorer and/or minority groups. It’s interesting how a person’s name is viewed as so indexical of his/her personality, whether or not it really is.

But whether your name really reflects your personality or not, you will still be judged by pretty much everyone else in the world as though it is. That’s just the way it is. My co-workers admitted to me, months after I was hired, that when they were accepting applications for my position, they didn’t consider the applicants who had really weird names as strongly as those with normal names. In much the same way as the name “Justin Bieber” is associated in our minds with a young, high-voiced teenage boy over whom 12-year-old girls fawn, there are certain traits of a name that will pretty much automatically prevent you from ever being taken seriously in life.

Point is, we all know that weird names pretty much condemn kids to certain personalities (come on. We all went to grade school. We all made fun of the kids with the funny names). And yet, despite this knowledge, parents continue to name their kids really weird, goofy names. In fact, it’s becoming really popular now to pick out as bizarre a name as possible for your child in the name of “originality” and “uniqueness”. This is of concern to me. These parents should really know what they’re doing to their kids (like I said, we all went to grade school), but they don’t seem to understand. So I’d like to supply you all with a list of traits that should never be included in a name. (Unless otherwise indicated, all points apply to first names only.)

- Anything with punctuation. There is no name for which this is not true. No hyphens. No apostrophes. No dollar signs. No asterisks. No parentheses. Just don’t do it.

- A first name that rhymes with the last name. It’s not funny and it’s not cute. There is no way a person will be taken seriously with rhyming names. I would even go so far as to say never to choose a first name that begins with the same letter as the last name, but name alliteration is much less awkward than name rhyming, and can be left as more of a personal preference than a steadfast rule.

- The name of a place. I might get a lot of disagreement on this one, because it’s a really popular trend right now. But seriously, no one wants a name that’s also somewhere you can go. It will unfailingly cause people to assume that the child’s personality is representative of whatever ethnic/cultural group is from the place for which he/she is named. Please don’t carry out your world traveler fantasies through the naming of your baby.

- A name for a male that is more commonly a name for a female. I can’t think of many exceptions to this rule. There are very, very few truly gender-neutral names in existence. Do you really want your son to grow up with the name “Leslie”? I don’t even think an exception should be made if it’s a family name. Your great great grandfather was named Leslie because in 1860, it wasn’t a feminine name. Now it is. Things change. Your son’s going to get beaten up on the playground with a name like that. If you really feel the need to keep the tradition, make a slight alteration: name him Lester instead. (To clarify: I don’t believe that this rule applies as heavily the other way around—i.e., naming your female baby a something that is more commonly a male’s name. Girls have an easier time overcoming name-gender stereotypes. I’d just exercise caution in the degree to which the name you choose is masculine: Don’t name your baby girl “John” or “Andrew” or something clearly masculine.)

- An uncommon name of a celebrity. This one is less about your own preferences and more about what you’re doing to your kid with a name like that. I can understand if you want to name your kid after a celebrity with a common name. It’s your own business the type of people who are inspirational to you; I can’t condemn that. It’s more about the immediate association people will make when they hear the name. Naming your baby Julia because your favorite actress is Julia Roberts is acceptable, because the celebrity is not the first association people will make when they hear the name. But if you want to name your kid after a celebrity with an uncommon name, whether you like the celebrity him/herself or you just like the name, please think again. Do you really think a girl named Beyoncè won’t get made fun of growing up? Do you really think a guy named Ziggy won’t be looked at a little strangely when he’s interviewing for a job?

- On the same vein, a name that is more closely associated with a pet’s name. I’m talking to you, people who’ve named their daughters “Marley.” It doesn’t matter that you think it’s a really pretty name. It doesn’t matter if you thought of it before the book/movie came out. The association is there now, and it will be for years and years to come. You can’t use that name anymore. You just can’t. Sorry. Pick another one. There are literally thousands out there.

- A real word that is not a real name (applies to the English language only, because I know this is common in other countries). There are some names that are also real English words, like “Mark” or “Brooke.” They’re okay because they’re socially acceptable as names as well as words. I’m talking about words that have no business being names. Like “Apple.” In what universe could that name possibly capture the essence of a personality? You might as well name the kid “Refrigerator.” Just because you chose a word out of the English language at random does not mean you are creative. (The exception to this rule: nicknames.)

I don’t think these rules are very difficult to follow. I could have listed many more things people do with names that I can’t stand, but in an effort to be as non-judgmental as possible, I listed only the worst atrocities. Please, parents, just be good to your kids and follow the rules put forth above. Your kid will thank you later in his life when he asks, “What was I almost named?” and you tell him “Lindsey” and he thinks about how much he hasn’t been beaten up on the playground lately. I can assure you that the rest of society will thank you as well. It will be one less La’Qui-shah running for president in twenty years; one less Paris teaching our children, and one less Baxter doing our taxes for us. The world will be a better place.

Facebook Friends: A Comprehensive Analysis

You’ve had a crappy day at work. You’re exhausted, mentally and physically. All you want to do when you get home is flop down on the couch and enjoy a little time that is completely your own; time that you can fill with virtually any activity you choose. So what do you do? You open up your computer and you read a series of short summarizations about all the mundane things your friends are doing and thinking. And then, when you’ve finished reading all of those, you post an equally mundane summarization of your day, content with the knowledge that, as you type, your friends are also getting home from work and flopping down on the couch, as eager to read about you as you were to read about them just a few minutes ago.

This concept of computer-mediated “hypernarration” (I don’t know if that’s my own term or someone else’s) in the context of social networking websites like Facebook is a fascinating study all its own, but one that’s a little too academic for the purposes of this blog. What I find peculiar about the whole thing is that, despite differences in age, personality, and various socioeconomic factors, all of us Facebook users tend to have the same types of Facebook “friends.” The specifics may differ, but I think that a few different general categories stand out prominently, and if you have or have had a Facebook, you’ll be lying if you don’t agree.

1.) Your “best friends”

These are usually the people you’re closest to in real life-- best friends, significant others, family, etc.-- and also the people you’re most interested in on Facebook. In addition to commenting on almost every one of their statuses, you check their profiles daily- sometimes more often- just to see if anything’s changed. These are the people to whom, when they call/text/visit you to tell you some piece of news, you’re not embarrassed to admit, “I know, I saw you changed your relationship status/employment status/profile picture!” You understand their more cryptic status updates. You know when and where every one of their profile pictures was taken. And they’re some of the only people whose particularly mundane statuses actually interest you.

2.) Your “frenemies”

You have some friends in real life who aren’t exactly your favorite people in the world, but they’re tolerable, because maybe you don’t have to see them every day, or maybe they’re relatively shy and quiet in person. Parents and other relatives can often be a good example of this type of friend (but, of course, not my relatives).

But in the faceless, blameless world of social networking, these people have a fresh realm in which to annoy you. Those friends whom, ordinarily, you only have to tolerate in small quantities seem to pop up on your Facebook news feed multiple times a day, every day. The ones who are normally quiet and reserved seem to kick down their walls of social anxiety over the Internet, and they too develop what can only be called “Facebook diarrhea”.

And their posts could not be more annoying. They can be pointless, boring, pretentious, whiny, or rude. Frequently, they’re some combination of those. The worst of these friends will even intrude so much as to comment all the fucking time on every fucking thing you post, until it comes to the point where you censor what you post to minimize your chances of hearing from them. Because the problem is, you can’t un-friend these people. You still have relatively regular real-life interactions with them, and they’d notice if you were to un-friend them. They always notice. There’s a special place for this type of friend, and it’s under the “hide posts from” option on the bottom of your feed.

3.) Your “photogenic friends”

Some of your Facebook friends are fucking gorgeous, sexual preferences completely aside. Maybe they have photographer friends who love to take artsy photos of them. Maybe they entered the performing arts after high school-- acting, singing, modeling-- and they always look perfect in their profile pictures. Or maybe they’ve just always had perfectly sculpted arms/faces/boobs. Either way, you have to keep these people as your friends so you can see any and every new photograph of them, and drool.

4.) Your friends who are your age, but are in completely different life stages than you

You know exactly what I’m talking about. The girl who sat next to you in math class had a baby while you were off at college, acting like one. A friend of a friend you met one time married her military boyfriend and moved to a different country. A guy from your elementary school t-ball team just graduated with his MBA and was hired at an accounting firm where his starting salary will be six figures. And you follow their every post, because you need to know how the other half lives. You are absolutely fascinated by every wedding photo, every pre-natal appointment update, because these people have lives that you very much do not. It doesn’t matter whether or not it’s a life you actually want. But maybe you will have the same experiences someday, so you need to know what it will be like. This type of Facebook friend is the perfect window into your future.

5.) Your “trainwrecks”

This is, without a doubt, my favorite type of Facebook friend, and I’ll bet it’s yours, too. You may have any number of different relationships with your trainwreck friends. They could be ex-lovers, old classmates you always hated, family members, and so on. But the two things they all have in common is that 1.) they haven’t got their lives even a fraction of together, and 2.) they’ve done something to you in life such that you now very much enjoy your front-row seat to their ongoing shitshows. Maybe the girl who beat you to the valedictorian spot in high school now has, and posts about, nightly panic attacks due to her massive Harvard workload. Maybe your first boyfriend posts photos of one skanky chick after another, and you watch with joy as his relationship status changes weekly. Maybe the bitch who always made fun of you in the cafeteria now gets bombed nightly, and posts varying degrees of embarrassing photos of herself-- drunk table dancing, drunk screaming-with-her-eyes-closed, drunk doing Car Bombs, and drunk stripping-- all of which will surely prevent her from ever acquiring a marginally respectful job. These are people who you’re clearly beating in the game of life, and you keep them as friends on Facebook so you don’t miss a second of the wonderful, terrible show.

Stories From The Sex Shop, Part II: Superfluous Papilla

One chilly January night, my co-worker and I were trying to make our shift pass more quickly. It was that time of year right after Christmas, but not quite close enough to Valentine’s Day, so very few fun-seekers had wandered in to the store that night. This made for easier conversation between my co-worker and I, and somehow during the course of our chat, we ended up on the subject of superfluous papillae.

“Superfluous what-now?” Pat said after I’d stated the term.

“Superfluous papilla,” I repeated. “It means that you have an extra nipple on your body somewhere.”

She was enthralled. She hadn’t heard of it before, and had more than a few questions about it. As we speculated over the specifics of such a condition, a couple wandered into the store, minding their own business. After offering them help, we fell quietly (we thought) back into our conversation as they browsed.

“I mean, does it lactate? Can you get milk out of it?”

“I don’t think so. I think it’s just a show nipple. It’s not like it’s hooked up to anything.”

“Well, how does it happen?”

“I dunno. Maybe it has to do with re-absorbing a twin in the womb or something.”

"So it's like a tiny Siamese twin?"

“A Siamese nipple?” We laughed.

“That’s crazy. I can’t believe I’ve never heard of this before,” Pat said. “I wonder how many people have this. What is it called again? Superlative-what?”

“Superfluous papilla,” I said.

“I have one,” a voice said.

We looked up. We’d almost forgotten about the browsing couple. They had both turned toward us, and the woman was nodding. “I do,” she said.

We stood, openmouthed for a second, trying to go over what we’d just been saying in our heads. Had we said anything rude? Had we used any slurs to which the abundantly-nippled population might take offense (Did I say the word “udders”? Anything about nursing a litter? Shit, “Siamese nipple” might be trouble.)?

Mostly, though, I think we were in shock. I mean, what were the fucking odds that someone with an unusual amount of nipples would happen to come into the store just as we were talking about it?

It was a legitimate question, actually, and I wanted to know the answer.

After a moment, I decided to take my chances. “Do you really have one?” I asked the woman timidly.

“I really do,” she said.

“She really does,” her husband echoed. “I’ve seen it.”

Pat and I looked at each other. “Well…” I said. “I mean… if you don’t mind me asking… where is it?”

The couple laughed and came over to the counter. Thank God.

“It’s right here.” The woman pointed to her left side, about halfway down her torso. I tried not to let her see me looking for any sign of it. Please, someone come in the front door, I need some cold air to waft over here…

“Wow. That’s… I mean, I don’t mean to be rude or anything…”

“No, I don’t mind,” she said, laughing again. “I used to be embarrassed about it, but now it doesn’t bother me.”

I took that as an invitation. I was beyond excited at this point. I had never actually met anyone who possessed a third nipple. I had so many questions. I tried to choose the most pressing ones. “So what does it look like?”

“It just looks like a nipple,” her husband said. “Like a regular nipple. It used to creep me out, but now I don’t really notice it.”

“It’s not shaped weird or anything?”

“I mean, it’s a little smaller than my other two, but that’s about it.”

“Do you know why you have it? I mean, why it’s there?” I could tell I was embarrassing Pat at this point, but I realized that I may never have this opportunity again in my life, and I had questions that needed answers, dammit.

“Not really, no.” The woman shrugged casually, as if her third nipple was completely normal, arbitrary conversation material that came up often when talking to strangers. “They never really told me anything about it.”

I shook my head in amazement. “That’s so interesting,” I said. “I didn’t mean to bother you or anything, I’ve just never met anyone who had one before.”

“Oh, it’s really fine, I don’t mind!” The woman said again, laughing.

After a few more casual exchanges, Pat rung up their purchase for them, which happened to be a fishnet body suit. Now, I’ve never seen anybody wearing one, nor have I ever donned one myself, but I assume, according to the lovely picture on the box, that one of its primary perks (no pun intended) is the way your nipples can stick out between the fabric, like they’re pointing at your seductee, beckoning him/her toward you.

It goes without saying, then, that their purchase opened my mind to an entirely new set of questions as well as images over which to ponder.

I kept my mouth shut, though. I decided that I’d bothered the woman enough for one day. Also, I didn’t see how my new set of questions wouldn’t cross the line of being offensive. There’s curiosity, and then there’s verbal sexual harassment. It’s a fine line, and when you work in the industry that I did, it’s definitely not a line you want to toe.