staring at the looking glass
Romance, dilemma, and somehow I take comfort in the fact that I'm not the only one to face them. It's actually funny in a way, the harder I try to fix my problem the worse they become. It's hard for me just to sit back and let everything unfold, but that seems to be the wisest course of actions usually. I don't think there has ever been an exception, even with girls I tended to rush blindly in. Yeah....... I'll let you guess how that went. And I thought I was supposed to have that damned "luck O the Irish". That's irony speaking for you; well it's good I have a pretty morbid sense of humor.
In class a week ago my professor handed all the students a hand mirror and told us to write about what we saw in it. I looked into it and I saw a bigger guy, tall, with a really thick neck. It never bothered me until this summer, my neck that is, until one of my grandmothers friend, Fred Schmidt, looked at me and said, " Will you look on the neck of this guy, you're a born football player aren't you boy." He meant it as a complement, as I can't see this guy saying anything mean to everybody, but you'll understand the irony in a second.
I am not athletically gifted. I enjoy sports, but I love writing, literature, art and nature. I am a romantic in the body of a jock. The more I think about it the harder I laugh. Can you imagine a 6'3" 230 lb guy sitting down and writing a decent poem with actual deep meaning? Neither can a lot of other people. I have been accused of paying people to write my papers by several teachers because they were written too well, and I just didn't look like I could pull it off. That's why I hate that damn neck. It's funny, maybe it adds to my personality. I know it's funny, and I know I can't do anything about it, so why does it bother me?
To be honest I like the way I am. I love being able to reach the tops of cupboards, yes sitting in the back seats of cars usually sucks, but give and take ya know. Being big also discourages jerks from picking on you, but it also gives you a moral obligation not to knock that tiny protagonist on his keister. I love being me, I just don't like people instantly dumbing down their conversations because they assume based on my appearance that I don't have a clue.
The next time you see a meat head, do me a favor, ask him what he thinks about literature, not how the packers are doing.
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