anomalies

after years of remaining completely off my radar, the song "Head Over Feet" by alanis morrisette made its way into my consciousness today.  i found myself humming, at first, and then singing it loudly (and with uncanny resemblance AM herself) on my drive home.  even when i had finished, one line stayed with me.

"you asked how my day was."
and then,
to emphasize the profundity, a repeated,

"you asked how my day was."

it's as though the idea that a person who asked with genuine interest about her day was such an anomaly in her life that she had no choice but to fall head over feet in love with this virtuoso in human connection.

at first i found the whole thing pathetic.  who are you, desperate 90's woman, who is so lonely in your angsty broken world that basic gestures of kind human interaction constitute reason to become utterly smitten?  do you think you deserve so little?  are you that dumbfounded that someone cares about your day that you had to repeat the words to yourself to be sure?  in ways, the whole song screams of desperation and self loathing.  the song's subject can do no wrong- they are the best listener she's ever met, they bring health and companionship and warm fuzzies to her life.  not to mention, they have manners.

She, on the other hand, will be the first to tell you how undeserving she is of anything so good.  she's a self-proclaimed mess who has never been treated well and has no qualms about sharing openly that she's not really sure she deserves said treatment.

HE HELD THE DOOR, FOR GODSAKE.  HE ASKED ABOUT YOUR DAY.  THAT DOES NOT MAKE HIM JESUS CHRIST COME BACK.  YOU CAN GET SUCH TREATMENT FROM THE DOORMAN AT WALMART.

so, there's that.

but you know, the more i thought about it... i kind of get it.  i can count on one hand the number of people in my life who express genuine interest in hearing how i'm doing without looking for the first breath to interject with their own lives or updates.  even with some of the people i value the most, i can tell it is a supreme STRUGGLE to give me (or anyone) any decent amount of undivided attention without steering the focus back to themselves.  and don't be misled, i have AMAZING people in my life.  INCREDIBLE people.  good, quality human beings.

i'm sure i dominate conversation or am self focused at times, too.  but i think more often i'm at the other end of it.  the pathetic alanis morrisette end.  the end where you walk away from a conversation and realize that you didn't really share anything about yourself at all, and that the other person didn't seem to care too much. over time, you start to curtail your sharing to bare basics... as though if you exceed a certain word count, the opposite party will have no choice but to lose interest.  you find yourself apologizing for rattling on if you find that you've been talking about yourself for more than a few minutes.  and that's just pathetic.  that's Giving Tree pathetic status.

these are sort of new thoughts.  not sure what to do with them.  just noticing that the world seems to be full of sharers and listeners... and i don't think that one role is necessarily better than another.  i'm drawn to people who know how to walk the balance between... who feel that what they have to share has worth and also has genuine interest in listening and learning from the sharing of others.

the rarity of those types of people is a tough pill to swallow.
jagged, even.

too much?

(never forget)