High Anxiety

Do you ever wonder how you get yourself into such a naturally untenable position? Well, I've managed to get myself into two. And I'm seriously wishing that I had some type of prescription drug habit to help me cope. Dr. House? You there with the Vicodan?

I'm not a social creature. I'm pretty sure some people would classify me as downright anti-social or as my new beau so politely put it, a little on the reclusive side. To clarify though, Im not mean spirited nor do I think most people are somehow bad. I just don't have the mingling skills most girls seem to acquire somewhere along the way, so unless I know someone, I don't really know what to say.

But this weekend, I have two huge (one figuratively and one literally) social events. Gah. Why me?

The first is the most emotionally signifcant -- a birthday dinner for the new beau's sister. That is happening tonight (supposedly anyway -- I still have no details!). Which means, in addition to his mother and son, to whom I was briefly re-introduced to last weekend, I get to meet and hang out with his dad, his sister, her husband and presumably her three-year old daughter. That's a lot of people. And because he'll have his son, whom he hasn't seen all week, his attention will rightfully be on him, not me. So I'm kinda gonna be out there on my own. Thankfully, it's a birthday party, so hopefully the focus will be on his sister, so I won't have to talk much.

The second is literally the bigger of the two -- a karate tournament. Which means that I've somehow decided that it's OK to put myself in a situation where people are going to stare at me. Fortunately, most people don't care about the girls, so the crowd watching me will be significantly smaller than if I was one of the guys. But there will still be a degree of people watching and yes, judging what I'm doing. There's obviously a lot less talking involved in this, but there's still an awful lot of people I have to interact with.

So gentle readers, please say a kind prayer to the deity of your choice for me tonight and tomorrow. I think it's Nietsche who said that what doesn't kill us, makes us stronger. If that's true, I'll be giving Achilles, Xena and Muhammad Ali a run for their money by Sunday.