Here's a very true fact about me.
I was a little bit boy crazy. Gasp, I know, it's true, it happened.
I had many real-life crushes but, even worse, my walls were covered in magazine clippings and home-computer print-outs and life-size posters of Orlando Bloom, Tom Welling, Elijah Wood, etc...my adolescence was obviously smack dab in the middle of Lord of the Rings and Smallville mania.
It was a good time, my friends.
I was young and foolish I suppose, but you know what else? I was still young and foolish when I got married. Maybe I still am. Is there such a thing as being young and foolish until you're old and grey?
I feel like I can say I'm not young and foolish anymore...but I also feel like that's something a young and foolish person would say.
I'm getting off track I think. The point of this whole conversation is that I kind of got to skip the whole dating scene. I was the typical boy crazy adolescent, but my husband and I started dating in high school in the midst of all that, and have been together ever since.
No awkward bar conversations, no flirting with strangers at the baseball game. No awkward pick-up lines. Part of it makes me feel a little excluded, because I don't have any funny awkward stories (about that, at least).
I did have a guy drop a sugar packet once and tell me that I dropped my name tag. But it was when I was 13, maybe 14, and it was at a Christian summer camp. Haha. Look out!
Until Monday, I had pretty much avoided all of those cringe-worthy encounters. I didn't know what being hit on would even be like.
I would just wave it off naively, like,
oh, he was just being friendly!
So here it goes: I work in a library, and there's a guy that I've seen several times due to his exceeding number of interlibrary loan requests. He's a nice-looking guy, maybe a year or two older than I am.
He's had some problems with his account lately, and after I helped him out again on Monday, I was starting to walk away when he quickly says,
"You're looking whimsical today, by the way." Wink.
I'm not gonna lie, I did love my crazy print-mixing ensemble and being called whimsical is the best kind of compliment for me, truly. Right next to
you could be in an Anthro catalogue and
I feel like Jess from New Girl would wear that. But then he winked and made it weird.
Why are winks so creepy? Why?
I love winking. I think it's adorable, it's sweet. But to a
stranger? There is nothing in the world that's creepier than being winked at by some crazy nomad, some wandering half-blinking soul.
You know when it's not creepy? When it's a secret, a wordless exchange between two people who know and love each other:
Heath Ledger in
A Knight's Tale, winking at his lady.
Geoffrey Rush in
The Book Thief when he's winking at Liesel, his adopted daughter.
Winks should be reserved for those who don't need words, because their hearts are already entwined.
Don't be a creep. Don't wink at strangers.
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