There is honestly a lady in one of my classes, she is around 50 years old, and she isn't from the United States. She has a personality comparable to a woman prison guard who is working at the prison to meet men. She sits in front of me and she is new to the program. She answers every question that the teacher asks, even the rhetorical ones, with whatever thought she was thinking, even if her thoughts are about Zoomba Dance moves and the teacher has asked us how we would counsel with those who suffer from schizophrenia, and when the teacher tells her she was incorrect and redirects her to the correct answer, my classmate says, "Oh, wow, that is what I was trying to say." or, "I was just about to say that." When she speaks I feel like I want to run into a burning fireworks factory in hopes that a bottle rocket will shoot up my nose and take me away from this woman's presence.
The other day in class, we were discussing the different types of research projects there are and how to recognize the difference, and we made it to a stopping point where the the teacher said a quick joke and took a drink of water. At this point, this lovely woman begins to speak, this really happened...
"Hey Miss, do you like my shirt, I made it myself!" (inappropriate laughter/ borderline cackle)
"What, I can't see it?" (the teacher is taken aback, maybe because they are the same age)
"I made it myself, Miss, my shirt. It says save a horse!" (Again with the inappropriate laughter. She then stands up in booty shorts and a tank top with the cursive words written in fresh puffy paint on it and rindstones all around the arm holes. She holds her shirt outward and does a full 360 degree rotation so that the whole class can see. No one is getting her reference and the Micheal Scott feelings are getting stronger.
The teacher looks around and says," Are you an equestrian?"
"No Miss," she says, "You know, 'Save a horse,... ride a cowboy.'"
It isn't that she has referenced this song, it isn't even that she has said something so inappropriate for her age or that she is half naked, or that she is saying this to a room full of zombie like grad students, who are dead tired and just want to make it through the next few minutes. It's that as she is saying this last sentance she has mounted an invisible horse...or dare I suppose, COWBOY, and is waving her arm around in circles above her head, in what I can only assume to be an invisible lasso. The entire class is speechless, eyes wide, mouths gaped, no one can comprehend that this is real life. Feelings are rushing back to each of us, the days we opened our envelopes filled with letters saying we got into a graduate program, and when we thought we were hot stuff, our mother's brimming with pride, only to see, this crazy beyotch, got into the same damn program. Well, universe you win!
Honestly, it makes you wonder, what if all these people weren't around or what if awkwardness didn't exist?? I think the world would be less funny, people wouldn't turn red out of compassion for the 'Michael Scotts' of the world, and we wouldn't have people to talk about. Being an awkward person, or 'AWKDAGON' as my friends and I call them, I really feel I have the capacity to empathize with these individuals. Come to think of it, I am pretty sure I have been an Awkdagon in many intances in each of your lives . And so I say, along with my fellow wierdos, or 'unusuals' we are here for you, we are here to help you feel better about your lives and situations. Keep in mind , dear friends, at some point, to someone, somewhere....we are all AWKDAGONS.
