Category: Uncategorized

A Guy Named “Dustin.”

Rob Says2 Comments

grayscale photo of man walking on road

Recently I’ve had a couple of things transpire, and it just so happens that both things can be related to one another.

The first thing that happened is I ran into a guy on Facebook that I used to go to school with. I’ll call him, “Dustin.” From K through 12 I went to school with this guy. He was the kid that felt that hygiene wasn’t a priority. From messy, dirty, greasy hair, to bad breath and dirty teeth, to body odor…You get the picture.

Dustin was a kid that was a true outcast. A real social misfit. I don’t recall this guy having friends throughout school. Ever. Most of it was because of the lack of hygiene, but some of it was also the fact that he had no idea how to deal with people socially. He was the Original Sperg.

If ever there was a guy who could have easily turned into a mass shooter, Dustin was it. I’m slightly surprised he didn’t turn out that way, but then again, he was missing something that a lot of shooters have. The anger.

For all the shit that Dustin went through and put up with, he never got angry or resentful, at least as far as I could tell. Nowadays he’s a grown man with a decent job, a wife of almost 25 years and a couple of kids. Apparently there is somebody for everybody. Don’t get me wrong, Dustin didn’t marry an 8 and God knows, he’s no 8 either, but they are similar in SMV. Basically they are two peas in a pod and happy as a couple of clams. Good for them.

When I said that Dustin went through a lot of shit, I’m not kidding. From early on in elementary school, right up to the end of high school, somebody was always saying mean shit to him and in a lot of cases, they were kicking his ass too.

Before anyone goes off about bullying though, understand this:

Dustin brought most of it onto himself. He would say obnoxious things to people and get under their skin to the point that they would end up kicking his ass. He would harass and bother people until they couldn’t stand it and then the beatings would begin.

I remember working with Dustin when I was 16. We both worked at a local grocery store as baggers. I remember him goading me and being a nuisance and a menace until I wanted to kick his ass like everyone else did. But then I realized something:

Kicking his ass was no major feat. Nobody high fived you if you ended up in a fight with Dustin. The only problem with kicking his ass was that it was too easy. He would bring that shit onto himself.

For Dustin, there was no such thing as bad attention. Any attention was good attention to him. An ass beating was just as good as a kind word or two. I remember realizing this and since I didn’t feel like kicking his ass, which would just goad him into more bad behavior, I ignored him. Completely.

He would stand in my way, I would simply walk around him. He would say my name or some other nonsense, I acted like I didn’t hear anything. I totally shut him out and initially it drove him nuts. Then it didn’t and he moved on to someone else that would pay attention to him and usually the pattern would begin again.

Lately I’ve seen people on Twitter that have beefs with other groups. Each group thrives off of attention from what I’ve seen. You talk positive or negative about them, you’re just giving that other group attention and validity. I’m not talking about the joggers and skateboarders out protesting. This has nothing to do with the rioting and politics, at least on any sort of major level.

This is simply two groups of people that have different points of view and neither side is going to convince the other side of the “rightness” of their cause. To me it’s simply a time for both sides to agree to disagree and move on. What’s the point when neither side is going to budge?

Both sides have approached me in one form or another. Both sides want me to side with “them.” Newsflash: I side with myself. Don’t drag me into your drama. Trying to “take on” the opposition is only giving them attention and validity. You are just reinforcing their point of view as being the “correct” one and they are just going to double down, dig in, and become further entrenched in their beliefs.

Why bother? Life is too short.

What do you hope to gain by taking them on? A dopamine hit? Some weird flex? Do you think you’ll “convert them to your cause?” You aren’t going to change their point of view when they have become invested in it and identify with it, so give that up.

The only thing worse than a guy playing Cap’n Save A Ho with a woman is a guy playing Cap’n Save A Ho with another guy. It’s not going to work.

Remember what I’ve said time and time again:

Let ‘Em Burn.

This is just like Dustin from back in the day, doing and saying stupid shit all for validity and attention. Just ignore them and move on.

It’s funny to me when both sides approached me. Immediately I started thinking to myself, “Why are you coming to me? What do you want from me? What are you hoping to gain by having me ‘on your side?’ What is your agenda here? What do you hope to gain from all of this?”

The only questions that I asked myself that really matter to me though is, why bother? Who cares? Why get involved? It’s not my circus and not my monkeys.

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Social Wasteland

Rob Says1 Comment

sand dunes scenery

I’m sitting here writing this and watching a couple of YHT (younger, hotter, tighter) drinking and dancing on Facebook Live. They are listening to an eclectic bunch of music, everything from Fleetwood Mac to Type O Negative, and they are really getting into it when Tool comes on.

Ah, the goth scene. Where everyone dresses in black and the music bleeds like heroin and melancholy. I remember those days. Apparently there is a revival going on, goth is trying to make a comeback.

Watching these YHT dancing and drinking in front of the camera makes me a little sad. Sad for the fact that I’m reading the comments and listening to the girls interacting with the chat, and none of these souls know how to communicate with each other.

It would be fun and sexy, these girls have great moves and the curves in the right places to match, but they don’t know how to honestly interact with others. They are the very definition of “socially awkward.”

And it’s not just the girls on the video stream, it’s the entire chat. It’s their “friends” on Facebook. Nobody knows how to flirt. Nobody knows how to give or receive a compliment. Nobody knows how to communicate. And they want to. So fucking bad. Everybody wants to genuinely engage, they want to actually communicate with one another, but it’s like they don’t know how.

It’s something like:

“Hey, you’re cute.”

“I like corn bread and music and flowers?”

I sat and watched this for a while, watching those girls, and by girls, I’m talking about late 20-somethings. I watched them dance, and laugh, sometimes sing but mostly lip sync to their favorite songs. And I got sad. Sad because these girls were lonely. I could see it in their eyes. I could see it in their behavior. They weren’t drinking. They were medicating. They so desperately wanted to connect with someone and they didn’t know how. And the chat wasn’t any better. There wasn’t as much “thirst” going on there, since this wasn’t a public performance, but nobody knew how to really interact with each other.

It’s a malaise. No wonder people do the drugs they do. No wonder we drink to excess. No wonder anti-depressants and other SSRI use is off the charts.

We live in a time of relative peace, plenty, and prosperity. At no other point in history have we had it so good. We are living longer in general, we have the best medical technology to date, and we literally want for nothing.

And yet we do. Want. We want for something. We want for connection. We want for some form of intimacy and understanding. I saw all of this in those young women’s faces. I could see their lives of quiet desperation by the fact that they were “trying too hard.” Trying too hard to look like they were having fun. Trying too hard to get inebriated as quickly as possible so that they could be numb.

Numb from their malaise. Numb from their fear. Numb from life in general. Numb from the fact that things don’t always work out the way that you had intended.

That’s part of the problem though, being numb. You medicate away your pain, longing, and loneliness and all that is left after a brief high is numbness. And then that numbness becomes a sort of “pain” itself.

I stopped watching the video shortly after one of the young women decided to flash her tits. Of course she flashed her tits, it’s part of the script, it’s part of what you do when “you only live once” and “fuck the world” and give it the finger while sticking your tongue out.

I really worry about younger people today. They aren’t just starting at zero, they are starting at a deficit, a negative. Who is to blame and what is to blame doesn’t really matter because it’s not going to change the situation that they are in. Pointing fingers isn’t going to solve the problem.

I’m glad that I am where I am in my life and that I am who I am. I wouldn’t trade places with anyone.

Someone asked me what I thought about dating these days compared to when I was younger. I think dating has gotten easier as I have gotten older. In many ways I have more options now than I did when I was in my 20’s or even in my 30’s.

I know how to flirt and how to communicate and it blows women away when I can carry a conversation with them and it just flows. This isn’t just younger women who say these things to me, this is women in my own age group as well. Maybe that’s part of my “edge.” I don’t know and I don’t really care all that much.

It seems that at least with the younger crowd, the women don’t know what they want, and guys are too scared to speak their minds and say things that could be considered offensive. Basically guys don’t know how to communicate and I’m not talking about that tired trope of “communication is everything,” but I am talking about being able to not give a fuck if somebody doesn’t like what you have to say, but you’re willing to say it anyway.

It’s like watching two magnets where the “north” ends are pushing away from each other instead of a “north/south” dynamic that pulls them in together.

Where does all of this go from here? I honestly have no idea. It was a little bit of a shock to me to watch these videos of these young women and see them literally baring their souls for the whole world to see. To see their loneliness behind the booze and the sexy dancing. To see their awkwardness as they fumbled with communicating with their chat and to watch the chat fumble around as well. And to think, these were people that were in their mid to late 20’s, possibly into their early 30’s.

They were having a “not-conversation.” They were doing “not-flirting.” It was like fumbling around in the dark trying to find a light switch, because you could tell they were looking for it, everyone was. And yet nobody could find it and turn the light on. It was like they knew they were looking for something (the light switch) but they couldn’t describe it or knew what it looked like.

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Never Tell Me The Odds Part Two

Rob Says1 Comment
2020-07-13 (2)
I love seeing things like this.

I went to a couple of bars with a friend of mine this last Saturday night. It was the first time that I have been to a bar since the pandemic. There were a few slight changes that I noticed from the pre-pandemic days. Masks were required for entry and for when you were wandering around, but while you were sitting at your own table with your group, you didn’t need to wear it. Which leads me to believe that the whole mask thing is nothing but a bunch of bullshit.

That’s not the point of this post.

My friend and I were talking more or less all night long about women. His goal from the time that I have known him is that he wants “younger, hotter, tighter.” Why wouldn’t he? What’s not to want? Problem with my friend is that he’s in his head too much.

He would say all sorts of things to me and I would respond over and over with, “Yeah, but did you approach?” Of course he didn’t. I got so frustrated a few times that I wanted to punch him.

I’ve learned that guys will talk themselves out of damn near anything and everything.

I finally got to a point where I told him, “Dude, if you see a girl you like, just say hi. That’s it. Don’t worry about what else to say, don’t worry about how you are going to come off. Just smile and say hi. Then walk away. Do you think you can do that?”

Everybody has to start somewhere and when I first started learning about my own approach and social anxiety, that’s where I started. I would just smile and say hi and then go on my way. When that got to be no big deal, I would then add things to it and before too long I was having conversations with complete strangers. Sometimes those conversations went somewhere, sometimes they didn’t.

Baby steps.

It was getting towards the end of the night and we were sitting there, getting ready to leave when this redhead early 20-something walks by and my friend says, “Hi!” to her as she and her friends are leaving. The girl stops, looks at him, her face lit up and she says “Hi!” back to him. He proceeds to say something along the lines of “How are you doing? What are you up to?” And the girl walks over to him/us. She starts talking and of course, her cockblocking fat friend shows up, grabs her by the arm and tells her, “C’mon we’re going.” And drags her off. Right on schedule.

Not two fucking minutes later though, the redhead came back.

“Let me give you my phone number.” My friend handed her his phone and she put her number in it and told him her name was Hailey and that she wanted to talk to him. She then proceeded to leave as the cockblocker was making her way back to her.

If my friend had told me this story, I wouldn’t have believed it. Except I was sitting there, heard it with my own two ears and saw it with my own two eyes. I’m not leaving any details out, this is literally what happened, it’s literally the whole conversation that happened between the two of them.

He said “Hi!” She said “Hi!” The cockblocker showed up and whisked PYT away and PYT came back and gave him her phone number without him asking for it. I’m not exaggerating.

Was my friend simply the right guy at the right place at the right time? Probably. It definitely wasn’t because he had tight game and gave her some killer routine or that he looked like Chad Thundercock because he doesn’t. It all started because he chose to nut up, stop being a pussy, and he said hi.

One thing I can fucking guarantee you though is this: If he hadn’t said “Hi” to her, nothing would have happened whatsoever.

I’m so happy he did something. I feel like a Dad watching his kid ride a bicycle without the training wheels for the first time. I’m so happy for him, it was almost like it was me who got the number.

I’m sure there are plenty of naysayers who will say some stupid fucking shit like, “She probably does that with all the guys she meets.” Or something like, “Even a broken clock is right twice a day.” You know what? Who cares? Sit back in the cheap seats and Monday night quarterback this all you want. At least my friend had the courage to actually try instead of just talking about it or bitching and moaning about “wahmen bad.”

 

“Don’t care, got laid.” – Rian Stone

 

Never tell me the odds that you can or can’t do something because you’ll be right. If you don’t think you can, you’re right. If you don’t think something is attainable, you’re right. Who am I to try and convince you one way or another about your point of view that you so desperately cling to?

I’m so proud of my friend for taking a chance and getting out of his comfort zone for just a moment. Will he and that girl end up going anywhere or doing anything? Who knows? That’s up to them. It could go in any direction. I’m just glad he took a chance, otherwise she would have been the girl that he talked about later that he wished he had said something to and didn’t.

Well done my Friend, well done.

Next time, after you say “Hi,” you can think of something else to say or you can’t just listen to her blather on, because they do. Don’t worry about fucking it up because you probably will, and that’s okay because nobody is watching and nobody gives a shit.

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