That Mouth Holds A Big Foot

So today I got my haircut, which is something I always dread. Small talk is maddening and I’m not very good at it either. Finding some mindless topic to chatter on about takes great effort for me, so today when I had a good topic, I was very proud of myself.

The fact that the topic might be a social taboo didn’t occur to me. It should have.

This morning, one of the parking decks at my college was closed from at least 9am to 11am. I found out a little bit later that it was because a girl, a student there, had committed suicide by jumping off of the 9-story parking deck.

My idiot self thought this was a fascinating event that deserved to be my conversation-starter for the rest of the day.

Once I had driven to the local Easy Hair and was settling into my chair, I broke out my line.

“Well my day’s been interesting (complete and utter lie). When I got to college today, one of the parking decks was completely shut down. Turns out somebody committed suicide by jumping off of it.”

“Oh my God, that’s HORRIBLE!”

Right about now I realized the amount of social trouble I was in. I had just said something to my haircutter-lady that rocked her world in a bad way. Apparently, she thought suicides only happen on TV.

When I heard there was a suicide, I shrugged. A bunch of adolescents and early “adults” put into close quarters with each other, the pressure of grades, the ever-presence of alcohol and drugs sometimes putting people into a depressed mood – I’m surprised it doesn’t happen more often to be honest.

I may not have shared her shocked sentiment, but I realized that I had to recover fast or else I was going to be getting one shitty haircut, and have to sit through awkward silence the whole way through.

Thinking quickly, I replied “Yeah! Can you imagine what her family must be going through? Such a shame. But she picked a good day to do it; the weather is incredible.”

“Oh isn’t it? It already feels like summer!”

Now it was my turn to be shocked. The quip about the weather came out without me even thinking; the second I said it, I wanted it back in my mouth. I couldn’t believe she actually took the bait.

Thank God for people with short attention spans. Saving the socially awkward each and every day.

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On a (more than) slight side note, I noticed that Wal-Mart is the people-watcher's paradise today. It gave me an idea for a new blog post. HINT: It involves women drivers, and those god-awful ear piece cell phones.

De-Inspirational quote of the day:
Jon Stewart: Do you enjoy hearing other people’s problems?
Jerry Seinfeld: Yeah. They’re funny. Haven’t you found as a married man when you sit with other guys and they tell you what’s going on in their marriage, the worse it is, the more you laugh?