Jokers Gone Wild

There’s something undeniably adorable about a child who has misconstrued a phrase, or misperceived something to suit their own illusions. Like the kids who were born on the 4th of July and grew up thinking the fireworks were for them, we were all stars of our own mini-movies and the world was our screening room. My grandparents liked to gamble, and would sometimes use phrases like “hit me” when someone offered them a second meatball (not to perpetuate Italian-American stereotypes of gambling meatball-eaters…but I digress). Obviously, when it was time to join the conversation, to “roll the dice” (so to speak), I always thought the phrase was “Annie Up.” As a kid I thought this meant to be forthcoming, open, to bring it all to the table. You’re not playing if you don’t ante up, and there’s no bluffing in the ante, so you just put your money where your mouth is, and game on!

In the same way that people mistake kindness for weakness, it has become apparent to me that sincerity and genuine intentions are often mistakenly perceived as intensity. I’m not sure I fully understood this until recently, but it seems like, in a town like this one, in the culture I have become absorbed in, integrity is hard to come by; honesty is rare. For the most part, people insulate themselves with pretense, fill their lives with drama, and distract themselves from the truth—through the scene, the swill, or the sex. Thus, when an anomaly comes along, when one encounters a person of substance, of character, she is likely to be misconstrued as severe.

In my younger years, I considered myself to be somewhat cheeky in my response to the every day questions regarding my identity. Are you an academic? A liberal? A homosexual?—I would answer them all the same way “I’m an actor, I can be whatever you want me to be.” What once I considered clever/charming, I now see as rather reprehensible. This answer shows a distinct lack of character. It’s a chicken’s way of avoiding controversy (at best) or a sociopath’s method of bluffing, evading self-definition. And because I am neither a chicken, nor a sociopath, I am somewhat mortified to admit to this pathetic show of “wit,” instead of offering a legitimate answer to anyone who took the time to ask me a legitimate question. And perhaps this will not serve me in my defense of sincerity, but I’m putting this out there to say I understand that not everyone is yet ready to be open, steadfast, and consistently themselves—as true to that form as they presently understand it to be. But I think, in order to find real happiness, one must open up and “show their cards.”

It breaks my heart when sincere emotion is discarded and labeled “drama,” when people with good intentions are cast off for being “intense,” and when fantastic human beings absorb themselves in activities far beneath the level of their potential so that life does not disappoint them. I have a tendency to see people for who they could be and am consistently disappointed when they chose not to address what’s actually going on, to numb themselves to the truth and mistreat real circumstances as “drama.” It’s disillusioning/infuriating depending on whether or not you really cared for this person.

I took a break from being me this weekend. I’d be hard-pressed to tell you who I was, or what the hell I was doing; but I’ll assure you, the “drama” that I experienced, the “intensity” I encountered, did not mitigate the consequences of the old habits in which, I indulged. I won’t bore you with the debaucherous details of Friday night’s college antics, nor will I carry on about the closure I received from a surprising source on Saturday. But I will say that despite the drinks, aside from the action, and humoring the hangover, I learned something valuable: To someone insincere, earnestness is at best adorable, and at worst a fantastic tool for demolition in the hands of the manipulative.

I have handed over my integrity to all the wrong people and, consequently, been beaten over the head with it. I have no interest in being pathetic, but I shudder to think what life would bring if I decided to act out of amusement instead of emotion. The game of love is not to be played without currency. If there’s nothing to win, why bother? So I guess I’ll move on to the next table and Annie up…