Round People and Social Strivers

The family and I went to a minor league baseball game tonight. The action on the field was decent, but I couldn't help noticing a common trait shared by many of the people at the park. Lots of people were round. I'm not slim by any stretch, but I'm not round either. We saw the other extreme as well. Some body builder type walked by. Of course, he's round too, just in a different way. His clothes were tight. Everybody who was round worn tight clothes. There's a certain statement in that. I'm just not sure if it's intentional (well, in the case of the body builder the statement is intentional) or just a consequence of limited clothing options.

A few people I enjoy judging were not at my daughter's soccer game this morning. There are three families that are clearly very good friends. I'm not a very social person. I don't crave social interactions, which I'm sure people judge me for just as much I as judge people who clearly need to be surrounded by friends all the time. This particular group of friends clearly think of themselves as the popular clique. There is an effort in their socialness that I've only even seen in high school. Everything about them is a social statement. Their clothes, their car, their music (that one of them was blasting in her car before practice on Thursday, it was Justin Timberlake. Maybe the fact that I recognized the song says something about me?!), the same brand of sun visor that they wear. They want to be at the apex of the social hierarchy and do all that they can to get there.

I like to pretend that I'm outside of this social fray. I would say that I don't participate, but the fact that I'm at these things and visible to other people makes me a participant. I'm not Round and I'm not a Social Striver. I don't cultivate a look that signals my social intentions. I don't really have any real appreciation for how I'm perceived in the social mix of a large group. I don't aspire to achieve a certain place, so I don't do things that will make me acceptable to particular crowd. I don't want to have my party chair in the circle around the blanket. What do I want? Honest answer. I don't know. I was going to say that I'm socially undefined. That's not true. My society, by which I mean those people who see me when I'm busy judging them, has defined me socially. I just don't know how they've defined me...