Friday, June 30, 2006
(8:58 AM) | Anonymous:
Friday Afternoon Confessional: The Neuroses
I confess to being extremely nervous about being the first to confess. I confess that this nervousness is due in part to worrying that if I confess something that really should be confessed it could get me into trouble or come back to haunt me. I confess that it is also due in part to worrying that if I confessed something that I thought was a big deal (the thing with the Czech taxi driver that time in Frankfurt), other folks would scoff at the confession (like, who hasn't slept with their cab driver).I confess that these worries about confession led me to even greater anxiety: to whom, actually, am I confessing? Do my guilty worries cover over the fact that there is no big Other hearing my confessions? Or do they point to a worry that somehow these confessions do register somewhere?
I confess to extreme vulnerability to marketing. I confess to an unbecoming attraction to mass phenomena. I confess that this vulnerability and attraction led me to purchase a container of four premade vodka cocktails (even though I have never been a fan of tropical blue lagoons, lemon drops, or appletinis) because I liked the font, the ribbon handle with little charm, and the four different colors of the bottles. The swizzle sticks (again in four colors) were an added bonus. While I'm at it, I might as well confess to buying crocs for myself and my kids and to feeling very pleased with myself even though it looks like we are all wearing flippers or clown shoes.
I confess to envy, covetousness, pride, zealotry, vanity, and insecurity. I confess that I worry that confessing leads to self-centeredness. I confess to worrying that not confessing leads to complacency. I confess to finding side-taking preferable to ambivalence but that I have a hard time deciding, sometimes, not all the time, ok, every once in awhile, what side to take.
I confess to sometimes feeling oddly competitive about relatively trivial matters. I confess to worrying that not many people will confess and that this will mean that I did a poor job leading confession. I confess that I was tempted to invite people now to relieve themselves, but thought better of it.
You know what to do.
