Class-mates. It’s seemingly random. The nerdy guy with greasy hair, the intelligent but shy girl with the glasses and hair tucked behind her ears, the group of “popular” girls who are identified by their girlish squeals and bubble-gum conversation, the superior-intellectuals aka mr/ms know-it-all who sit by themselves and finish tests by just looking at the paper, the weird/eccentric guy who gets along with everyone, the foreigner who is quite intelligent but people doubt it, the girl who can’t stop thinking about her boyfriend, the girl who thinks everyone wants her/wants to be her, the guy who never does any work….
The list goes on, but I’ve always had a problem with a couple of types – since the dawn of my schooling life. It takes up so much of your time, it’s only natural to experience irritation at some …’types’.
I hate, really hate, the self-obsessive type. They love to bring the focus onto themselves. People always classify them as being deeply insecure, that’s why they have the need to draw attention to themselves. I don’t buy it. I have more insecurities than anyone I know and I can only bring attention to myself with people I consider family. I knew several girls like this – but there are a few guys who belonged to this group, in school. They aren’t Hermione’s, no, they are the cooler version of her though – like they wouldn’t dare lift their hands – they’re cool. When someone doesn’t know something, Ms Know It All will smirk, give the sod a pitying look and (without lifting a hand) speak over voices, ignoring raised hands, proceeding to say smugly “I think…” – somehow, she does indeed know the right answer. She really IS a know-it-all. But because she knows this too, I won’t – like everyone else in the class – acknowledge it.
Then there’s group work. Don’t you hate that garbage?
Ms Know-It-All gets quite mad with other people’s ideas but doesn’t show it, though you can hear it in her smirky nasal voice dripping with disdain, she says “I am not happy with your ideas but well, fine, let’s do that.” Oh Queen KIA, we apologise profusely for making you unhappy with our humble opinions, we were under the impression it was group work, not your work, forgive us for this heinous act on our foolish part.
As group work is about a team, there is a general flurry of questions and answers floating about, you can hear – “What’s this?” “What does this mean?” “Doesn’t this mean -…?” The KIA gets a satisfaction when people ask these questions, and responds haughtily “Don’t you know anything?” with a sweet smile disguising her …well, let’s just say it… inner bitch from being recognized too quickly. As a part-bitch myself, I (sadly) am able to identify them, not immediately. It takes me ages to see it, when I first meet someone – anyone – I love them, I think they’re fantastic, even after my brain warns me “This always happens. Don’t trust your first impressions”, but I still make the same mistake – I start to believe in the awesomeness of People. Then, when they prove themselves so common, all you’ll hear coming out my mouth is “PEOPLE SUCK. I HATE PEOPLE” for days, but I get over it. I never make that mistake again with that particular person, at least.
I am not over it right now. I want to say something. But I never know what. That idea of treppenwitz comes to mind, I experience it often. My mind’s belated yet sharp wit, ah! I think it’s partly because I cannot be confrontational unless in the rare occasion someone close to me irks me.
I thought I could respond with kind, but when the Superiorists didn’t know the answer to a question, I couldn’t find it in me to be like them. It infuriated me. I can’t believe that high-school does not, in fact, end. At the end of a test, these people sit and make a show of being bored by yawning and stretching, tapping their feet impatiently, and staring around them as if to say “That was too easy, what can you possibly be writing still!” They are also full of ‘advice’, and I use that term lightly. You’re minding your own business but they feel the need to impart their 18-19 years of wisdom upon you because surely, you need it, even though you had higher scores than they did in the last test. They begin this bit with “You need to/should do” . They also never ask for anything, how bourgeois.
Once, I told my sister: “I realized I’m a doormat.” She almost choked, “YOU?? Uh. A doormat??” My family knows me better than anyone. I don’t show my emotions to anyone else, unless it’s excitement/nerves or a “hidden” show of disappointment – people respond to this brand of manipulation easily, I think it stems from being the youngest, for example: Policeman pulls you over because you were on the cell phone while driving, he tells you he’s going to have to fine you – you turn on skills you didn’t know you had, mad acting skills, the panic in your voice and the stricken face, “I won’t do it again”, the “I’m a student” card – which could mean your parents are going to kill you or you can’t afford the fine. They let you off with a warning in 5 minutes, and you didn’t even have to have a trembling lower lip. People have claimed to hate this, I couldn’t care less. Worry about your actual relationships before protecting the general public from your hypocrisy.
So, doormats are not brutally honest, straight-forward etc. Doormats are nice people who smile a lot and offer to help when you need it. Or is that just the definition of a nice person? Of course, and they’re usually the people other people (those evil twits) assume to be “stupid pushovers”. Why bother, right?
I suppose – because not everyone takes advantage of a person’s good nature. In fact, if you really think about it – it was a small percentage of people in your life that did do that. A tiny, insignificant number of people. Be glad they showed their crazed personalities, it makes it easier to sieve out the ones that matter from those who don’t. Those people have no space in your life, and no right to your awesomeness, but this is the hard part – do you hit the bitch-button whenever you see them, or do you continue to grin and bear it because that’s what rising above is all about? Now that I’m older, I do a bit of both. It’s hard to always rise above, but with some people – you can’t risk not being polite.
I was listening to a lecturer talk at length about the characters of Wordsworth and Blake as Romantics. I had no idea what Romanticism was, and it certainly is more than what I’m about to describe – he said they were very idealistic and believed in an almost Utopian world – they believed in people’s potential to be kind of perfect. They were impressed by the French Revolution, but, Wordsworth at least, became quickly disillusioned when it turned to violence and murder. Other Romantics accused him of withdrawing, some criticized him for being egotistical because the world was not turning out the way he desired. I went home and told Mr. B “I don’t belong in this century! I know where I belong now. With the Romantics. I’ve finally got a word for what I am – a Romantic!”
The best part was when our lecturer said how anti-education (institutional education) Blake and Wordsworth were, and when they went to university they described it as “being full of drunken idiots”. I lectured Mr. B on the Romantics and when I was done, he echoed what I was thinking “Wow. They sound just like you.” Now, if only I could write some brilliant poetry that isn’t such an effort. I have written 3 poems I would actually call poetry but they still weren’t ‘good’, so I gave up two years ago! Best thing I did 
Anyway, I thought hard about if I was indeed in the 18th-19th century. I would have most likely been either a slave to the aristocracy in England, or an Untouchable in India. So I’m happy here, where it only smells in some places and you can hire a domestic worker to do the ironing. Ah and not forgetting Pronutro.
Anyway you know what they say, bad publicity is better than none. I don’t think that of course, do I?