footsteps of a side-stepping man

This evening I drove down to the Norshor to check out the going-away party for a guy I don’t really know. Hans went to Kenya a ways back and lived in a Masai village and recorded African folk music to tall stacks of minidiscs. He made a lot of friends and is now heading back over, and someone got the groovy idea of throwing together a slideshow and musicians and alcohol to help raise a few bucks for his trip.

As I was walking to the theatre a car started yelling at me across the intersection, so I ran over to it and climbed inside. Jen, Laura and Lizzy were headed to the show as well, but now had to drive back to campus to pick up Laura’s ID. On the drive they talked about a kind of bra that I found absolutely fascinating, a kind of bra that can turn into a strapped and a strapless and a crossbacked and an airplane and a boat and a gigantic robot with laser guns and morals.

We got to the theatre just in time to catch the tailend of Hans’ slideshow. The Mary Bue All-Star Band followed. A mean bar lady came by at 10:00 and tossed everyone under the 21 out the door, including the gang of cohorts I had amassed since the bras. A terrible, horrible shame, as they totally missed out on Indefinite Particle Article and Teague Alexy with Medication. Nate and I danced our asses off. Mary said that we were dorks. Nate and I traded high-fives, as ‘nerd’ or ‘geek’ would be givens but ‘dork’ was actually quite an honor.

Luckily I soon found out I knew everyone else at the show through people in my social circles. He’s in Wooch! and that girl on stage is dating him, who knows that guy through work. He’s a music nerd and he plays in a band with that guy. You’ve played a gig with that guy, who’s in that band that opened for those guys. You opened for that band with that guy in it, who knows her, who hung out with your roommate last year. It was like a web that’s been forming at the periphery of my consciousness for four years was just now, in my last semester of college, pulling into view. I mean, I always knew the web was there, but now the apparent scale, depth and symbiosis of it is astonishing.

I also found out that ‘a girl’ is dating the lead guitar player of the band I really like, which really shouldn’t come as a surprise because evidence has shown I’m only attracted to girls that already have boyfriends. I really wonder why that is. Are they the only ones that act confident enough to seem to be worth a damn? Do they emit some sort of molecular TAKEN pheromone that I am genetically predisposed to find irresistable? Do I only feel safe in pursuing a relationship that I know won’t happen?

M’eh. Whatever. I’m hot. By the end of the night my dancing had soaked my I.H. Racing Team shirt through with sweat, and my glasses were smeared, fogged and smoked to the point of uselessness. Chicks dig the glasses because poor eyesight implies intelligence and sophistication. Chicks dig the heavy plastic rims because dorky glasses imply I need to turn down my hotness factor to keep the ladies from fainting in my wake.

What hath my wake wrought?