How I Can Make Sitting on a Bench Traumatic: Why I’m Never Really Bored

So I sat down on a bench, tired of walking, bored of thinking, and took to staring at whatever the bench stared at every day. This particular bench stared at the base of the local castle, and I started to think about how this wasn’t weird to me anymore. And then I reminded myself that I wasn’t supposed to be thinking because thinking was stupid—it rated right up there with “honesty,” which had taken a serious plunge on the charts lately (2008 was not a good year for honesty), and went back to simply staring.

Empty, thoughtless staring. Dishonesty and thoughtlessness—those were my new goals which would characterize being.

And, in the middle of my staring and thinking about not thinking, this little kid came out of nowhere and sat down next to me. Before he sat down, I saw him look over at me, look over at my bench, and I’m pretty sure I grimaced at him.

I was tired of kids.

I don’t know much about kids’ details—such as, what age usually corresponds with which height, but I guessed this kid to be around 8. He looked 8-year old height.

And then I went on to wonder why I was nervous to meet people much shorter than me.

So this little kid who may or may not be 8-years old frowned, and walked over to sit down next to me on my bench, taking no notice of my own glares and frowns. Thus, I was now sitting next to a kid, and I was very upset with myself for not sitting in the middle of the bench.

For my friend Amanda and I were just complimenting some guy for sitting in the middle of our bench—this bench belonged to her, because she sat on it every day—and, although we were prevented from sitting on it due to some guy, we were impressed by his astute positioning. For, if you sit in the middle of a bench, no one can really sit next to you. It’s magic Keep-Off for people. Unless they’re one of those horrid people who will just shove you over or, even worse, politely ask if you can move over so they can sit down. And they smile—not even a smug smile, but a genuine smile. Those people are the worst.

So I made the stupid mistake of sitting on the end of the bench. Remember, I wasn’t thinking, so it wasn’t completely surprising. In any case, I had left plenty of room for some other human to sit down next to me. It was almost an invitation like: “Here, here is a space just perfect for your body to sit itself—I left it just for you.”

Therefore, I was equally annoyed with myself, but still annoyed with the little creature, who obviously misinterpreted my bench vacancy. Yet, I also felt this reluctant curiosity about what a possibly 8-year old was doing on his own and sitting on my bench. He looked relatively clean and well groomed. He wasn’t wearing a school uniform but maybe it wasn’t a weekday. I thought about it and realized, no, it was a Saturday. No school. Kids in uniforms are very adorable, but, to an American, it looks like every kid here is a private school rich kid. But, no, everyone wears a uniform. Seeing tiny little people in suit coats, ties, short-pants and knee socks is funny to me because most American kids probably wouldn’t wear a full suit deal until their first funeral or prom.

For those kids who went to prom. I didn’t go to prom. We were going to go to Chicago and do something much cooler, but we decided going to the post-prom parties instead.

Anyways. So it was Saturday. A kid on his own. Sitting next to me.

Then, during the middle of this side-eye analysis, I realized that the kid was looking at me. And…I started to freak out a little. Now I definitely prefer kids to adults, but something about this kid kind of freaked me out.

This could have been due to my 9 years of parochial school or my being an only child, but I started to wonder whether this kid was a ghost or God or some demon in costume. He was too quiet. Too composed. Too…stare-y. And I don’t know where I get this stuff, but, regardless, I started to sweat a little.

Now I’m particularly disgustingly sweaty lately. And this could be because:

1) I’m constantly sick and I don’t know, which is likely because I have little attachment to my body, so I’m not really aware of what’s going on with it. My body is kind of like the autistic little brother that my mind loves and wants to take care of, but it gets upset because it doesn’t keep up with my mind, it always drags behind, ruins my mind’s plans and strategies, embarrasses my mind in front of its friends and makes absolutely no sense most of the time so my mind has a hard time figuring out what to feed it or what movie it wants to watch. And THEN my mind starts to feel guilty and chastises itself because…it also went to 9 years of parochial school where we learned that we are all equal and basic fuck-ups and require immortal and absolute assistance.

So I could be sweating due to sickness.

or

2) Scotland has this crazy climate that we still haven’t adjusted to—it’s not hot by any stretch, but, strangely, you quickly get sweaty walking around. Scotland is also to blame for my latest spaztastic (I’m an epileptic) brushes with death because it is closer to the North Pole than I have ever been and the magnetism may be fucking with my brain electricity or…something. This isn’t my theory because it’s scientific and I’m still a Christian, which my friends think is funny, so I obviously don’t believe in science. But it could make sense.

It’s funny that a spaz has actual spazzes. Of course, only I can think that’s funny.

So, probably thanks to the combined forces of sickness and Scotland, I showed off my sweating powers once more as this kid looked at me. And, for some reason, I was terrified. And I simply could not turn to look at him because I had transformed him from being just a little kid on his own to some sort of moral gatekeeper. So I just kept staring straight ahead, now frowning a bit, hoping to make him think that I was deep in thought and not a sociopath.

I suppose that a sociopath wouldn’t be afraid of some kid. Rather, I would be more inventive and sadistic—two more of my goals. But, sadly, I’ve simply seen Labyrinth too many times and I’m just insane. Maybe psychopathic, but, deep down, I don’t think I believe any of the things I freak out about. I just enjoy messing with myself. Which is why I find it funny when other people mess with me because they’re so pathetically worse at it than I am.

All of this freaking-out lasted maybe…3 seconds at most. And then it blew through and stopped and I still couldn’t say anything to this kid because now just enough time had passed and it would be awkward.

And this reminded me of dating and how I didn’t really date a lot of people. This scenario with the little kid was pretty much what happened every time I got near a boy. Minus the form-shifter part. These boys were scary on their own, just being boys, so I never assumed they were in costume.

So then this kid got up to go, and my adult side kicked in and I quickly asked, “Hey, are you okay?”

That famous question. Said so many times, heard so many times—usually through a wall of blur, never heard when truly needed, and never ever answered truthfully.

The kid stopped, turned around, and he shrugged with a weird look on his face. “Sure.” And then turned away and started to walk.

A weird look like…”Um, yeah, you freak.”

And, although I would often be suspicious of such a statement as my focus is child trauma and I understand the vocabulary of sadness; for example,

“fuck _OFF_” = “I am in pain. I appreciate you being here, but please understand that I am under duress and will not be able to talk with you right now. However, await further updates.”

Yet, in the case of this little kid, I didn’t care. My big attempt at empty staring was one big fucking failure and so I sighed, forgot my scarf on the bench, and made my way back home.

Where I then thought about making spaghetti and watched the boy play his Lord of the Rings video games.

If that kid was God in kid-form, then I guess I just damned myself to hell, which I’ve lately had a taste of because this fucking keyboard’s space bar does not work right and writing is more torturous than usual.

Hopefully I can make up for it.

Who is not sick of canting—saying,
In other phrase, things said before?
Of solemn efforts are conveying
Assurance—when we all were sure?

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Tags:

anxiety, morality, psychopath, social, sociopath and thinking