Yesterday, I attended a meeting--a very long, not very engaging meeting with colleagues from around the state. Not surprisingly, about ten minutes into it, my mind began to wander.
Just before we broke for lunch, one of my co-workers turned to me and asked "Are you all right? You keep wincing like you're in pain." She was absolutely right: my eyes were all squinty and I was biting my lower lip. It's the same face my gastroenterologist would see if he carried out his examinations in the missionary position.
But I wasn't in pain. I was wincing at something else--or rather somethings else. Since I had nothing better to occupy my attention during the afternoon session, I used that time to catalogue these facial tics into four different groups, based on their various points of origin:
- Wince Type #1 was the result of recollected embarrassing moments. This happens quite a bit when I have nothing better to think about--I start dwelling on drunken passes I made, or drunken statements I made, or just generally being drunk. My favorite half-memory involves passing out in the men's room stall of a restaurant and having to be carried out by my friends after the place closed. (Hey, it was college.) Ouch.
- Wince Type #2 was the result of me contemplating sex with some of my peers. Now, in a similar situation, normal people might glance about the table, focus their attention on an attractive man or woman, and commence daydreaming. Not me. For some masochistic reason, when I do it, I pick out the most unappealing folks in the room. My horrific sexual fantasies are like flabby, pasty, clammy train wrecks: disgusting, but I'm compelled to look. Eww.
- Wince Type #3 came from imagining the body odors of the folks inspiring Wince Type #2. I mean, if you can't reach it, how can you clean it?
- Wince Type #4 was of a different sort altogether and involved cell phones ringing. There's nothing like a hideous ringtone going off in the middle of a quiet conference room to make me cringe--mostly in embarrassment for the phone's owner. Ringtones are a marker of taste/class, and there's something inherently sad and declasse about folks who still use the 'Ride of the Valkyrie' ringtone in 2004. As they rush to the hallway to take the call, I imagine them saying to themselves, "Damn, I gotta upgrade to a phone that plays chords." Of course, none of this would be a problem if they'd just set their phone to "vibrate" like sensible people.
