Tell Me I’m Pretty

Winter already, another quick year.

Stephen, Kieran and I were samba dancing atop support beams along the back elevated patio, about 5 meters off the ground, Stephen was the one who had the training and as such took instructor position, he was trying to describe how to move the torso in an independent motion from your legs and then your feet from your legs, so that you were essentially moving in 3 or 4 directions at once, Kieran turned to me, and started screaming with laughter. You forget, how ridiculous you look when you’re with friends don’t you?

I can’t be too sure what comes across on here but simply put, I’m not a big clubber. However I don’t mind dancing, I quite like it actually, it’s just that to me, going somewhere that makes it nigh on impossible to have a fucking conversation with someone, is an awful place to be, in that sense.

The general reason I see my friends is that fundamentally they provide good conversation, James is a bit different, we have good conversations of course but after such a long time together, since hmm about year 8 in high school, you do tend to run out of things to say, but it’s not unpleasant or uncomfortable, it’s very comfortable actually, he’ll often call me up and we’ll just sit on the phone silently doing our own thing.

It’s hard to describe the sort of idiosyncracies of a relationship isn’t it? They sound so much more peculiar outside of their natural circumstances, the idea of two people sitting silently on the phone together comes across as borderline lunatic but it’s actually very casual and normal. Ahh well.

I’m getting off subject would you believe, so, when I was up in Brisbane for Brent and Natalie’s going away night we went into the city to go to Club Heat, or something, it was this megaclub, a gay one at that, not my normal environment.

Natalie is a predator female, she doesn’t pay for her drinks at clubs, she explains to me "Oh you just have to smile, and so if I look at a guy at the bar and smile at him and he buys me a drink who am I to refuse?" I detest insincerity and that predator behaviour, but frankly part of me thinks if someone is daft enough to think buying a stranger a drink somehow entitles them to her/him then they aren’t particularly good or clever people. That doesn’t make their behaviour wonderful but I suppose the only way you can fairly compare a poison is to another poison, it’s all about being fair.

I’d been up the whole night before with Stephen since we hadn’t seen each other for about a year and I only arrived at 3am anyhow, he stayed up for me kindly, he wanted to show off his life and get my opinion, he’s funny that way, he isn’t the least bit insecure or uncertain about things, he just always fronts it with the same statement "Paddy, when I got/saw/made/did this I knew you’d appreciate it." It’s not even so much about showing off really, it’s just knowing that someone agrees with you, empathises with you, that’s nice, I get that, I do the same with him.

So when I got to the club I hadn’t slept the night before and in addition to that I had been functioning on about 3 or 4 hours sleep for the two nights before that, I was exhausted, I really wanted to stay at Sam’s house and sleep but I had asked Kieran to come when I wasn’t so tired and it wouldn’t have been right to stay at Sam’s abandoning Kieran, in the end we only went to see each other and then we couldn’t even talk for the terrible noise.

I also had a terrible headache, most of Natalie’s friends were dull narcissists, boring people who were enamoured by themselves, which makes a bit of sense as Brent is king of the narcissists, so I understand her attraction to him but Brent is special, he is entertaining. So when we got in there the heavy beat of the bass was thumping along with my headache, the fog machines were set to forest fire and because I was sleep deprived my eyes were already sore and with the fog they began watering… I couldn’t talk to anyone for the noise and although I tried dancing it was all, very, hmm, dancing alone just seems weird to me, you dance with someone else, not by yourself, that’s how I have always seen it, so I had a few dances with stranger girls and guys, and then went looking for a place to sit with fresh air.

I did see some very talented dancers though I should mention, the night wasn’t a total loss, a little guy I started talking to, he would stand by the edge of the dance floor, waiting for someone to come along worthy of ‘busting a move on’. He was amusing and small and he was kind enough to show me a few moves, I liked him but he was a militant in his dance pursuits, I expect in his mind it was equatable to a battle ground, like I said, he was amusing and I liked him.

I found a bar against a large open window and sat down and began rubbing my head, my eyes were still watering at this point and I was alone, a guy came up to me, he gave the impression of being gay from the nature of his habits but that’s hardly defining evidence, so, I’m sitting down with my back to him and he walks up behind me and puts his arm around me, I look up at him, tears streaming down my face, I noticed his well tailored jacket and cologne, he smelt and looked good I must say, he placed his hand on the side of my face and wiped away one of the tears with his thumb, he leaned in and said "You’re too beautiful to cry."

He thought I was sad and crying from something…

It’s like something from a movie, a comedy of errors.

With the amount of noise and the situation there was no way I could explain to him all the very boring and somewhat self-indulgent reasons I had for being in that situation, and even if I did I doubt he would have belived me, so I just thanked him and told him I’ll be alright, he stayed with me for about a minute, his arm around me, he asked me a few times to come and join his friends but I just reiterated that I was alright and I wanted some fresh air. He finally left and pointed to where he would be if I was wondering.

It was a weird night.