- I don’t see them ever. I don’t know if they’re around me. I imagine if they do exist, they don't really make out with each other.
- I know some of them are around me, but they don’t make out on top of my desk. When I go home, I imagine they still aren’t making out on top of desks anywhere.
- I know some of them are around me, but they don’t make out on top of my desk. However when I go home, I imagine the hot girl ones are making out on top of my desk.
- I use the internet to find free videos of the hot girl ones making out, sometimes on desks.
- I break down and pay the monthly membership fee to a website with really hot girl ones. I do not tell anybody. However, when a guy in the office is a dick to one of the guy ones, I tell him to shut up because I’m trying to get work done. Guy thanks me. He is Sal. I have to hide the monitor from Sal because I am actually checking the website. I imagine they don’t know that. I still imagine that the guy ones don’t make out on desks anywhere.
- Tropical storms are just lame hurricanes. My car skids into a ditch. I spend forever trying to get service on fucking T-Mobile. A guy actually stops and helps. He has really nice hair and his clothes match. Is he one of the guy ones? I don’t know. His most activist bumper sticker is about meat being murder. I like beef. I imagine some of the guy ones like beef.
- My car slides into another fucking ditch because these hurricanes don’t know when to stop. I throw my piece of crap T-Mobile into the storm drain that the front tire is lodged in. A truck stops; inside are a guy and girl. They offer to help. The guy has really nice hair and gives off no sexy-vibes at the girl. Is he one of the guy ones, or am I racist? As they winch my car, I ask him. He looks at me like I’m the weird one. It gets awkward from there.
- After several months on the paid website, I realize the girl ones and I are on the same team. We have the same enemy: other girls. I go out to a bar with some people, including two people I suspect of being girl ones. They give me pointers. I feel less racist.
- I press my luck too hard. I go out to a bar with some people, including two people I suspect of being guy ones. I think I’m being amazingly cool telling them that I understand that I am their prey and feel unthreatened. I think they are amazingly uncool telling me I’m not “their type.” A fistfight may break out. I am informed “racist” does not mean what I think it means.
- Somebody is pissed at me. He/she/they makes a drawing of two guy ones making out on my desk, and the picture itself is left on my desk. I figure it’s Sal, because he’s a bitch. I leave a dildo on Sal’s chair. The entire office has to go for “sensitivity training.” It is bullshit. The two who are totally girl ones and I sneak out early to smoke. They mock me ceaselessly over the picture from my desk.
- So now some asshole keeps leaving the same picture on my desk every morning. The worst part: it becomes really funny. It winds up on everyone in the office’s desk. Then it winds up on the C.O.O.’s desk. She does not think it is funny. Even though I totally saw Sal sneaking out of her office that morning, I don’t rat on him. He’s just a guy.
- Office goes out drinking to celebrate two months without a natural disaster. Some guys are total dicks to our girls. I step in and promptly lose a fistfight. Because that wasn’t embarrassing enough, I also get arrested. Spend night in cell with Sal. He throws up on my jacket and I realize I don’t see him as a guy one anymore. Same for our girls. I just see them all as people now. Well, except for the hot ones. Hot ones automatically default back to “hot girl ones.” I use my new phone to look up if that makes me racist.
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Ah yes, the insidious advancement of tolerance where will it end? :-) I loved the conversational style, character opened up through dialogue and ended up feeling affectionate towards the whole cast. I'm becoming contaminated with love, peace and understanding. Better get out of here quick!
ReplyDeleteGrinned a lot through this and couldn't help thinking of one of my favorite lines from The Princess Bride, "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."
ReplyDeleteThe thing that struck me was, he was self-aware enough to understand he had a character flaw and — fumbling and stumbling as his attempts were — he set out to correct it. And it seems he made some progress in the end. Loved this.
ReplyDelete"I am informed “racist” does not mean what I think it means." LOL.
ReplyDeleteI was thinking the exact same thing Tim was thinking.
My cheeks hurt from grinning all the way through.
ReplyDeleteI think I used to work in this office... lol
Awesome job, Wiswell.
I always thought ROFL was just an expression, but by the time I read #4 I was almost in the floor I was laughing so hard.
ReplyDeleteWho says men can't change? Good one, John:)
ReplyDeleteAlison, now do you think he's really understanding of these other folks? Or just affectionate? Can they be separate?
ReplyDeleteTim and Laurita, you even caught my Princess Bride reference. Once I realized it was possible, I couldn't let it slip by.
Mr. FAR, do you think he's consciously trying to become more tolerant the whole time?
Apple, so glad it got you grinning. Did you find any part particularly funny or edifying?
Chuck, I really almost knocked you out of your chair? Because that would be one of my greater achievements in literature this year.
Anne, I never said men couldn't change - just that the paths might be funny.
Hehe, I couldn't stop reading. Funny!
ReplyDeleteI think this was less of a voyage about understanding others than it was of understanding himself. But maybe that's where these voyages begin. Very funny -- especially his "I understand you" attempts, since it's patently obvious at that point that he doesn't, quite).
ReplyDelete'Hot ones automatically default back to “hot girl ones.”'
ReplyDeleteBest line, because I think that is the biggest truth in this whole piece. No matter how hard ya try, ya still see sex for sex.
i love how T-Mobile makes the list
ReplyDeleteThe girls ones and the guys one made me laugh. And I think he become more self-aware by the end, but at first, it was all about the hot girl ones.
ReplyDeleteI don't know why your gay posts are always the best. It must be because to the hot girl ones. I was cracking up from #1 on. #giggleface
ReplyDeleteLoved the story, the conversational tone, and the humor throughout, but the style--a list--really made this. I don't think it would have read anywhere near as well as a straightforward narrative. Well done!
ReplyDeleteGanymeder, anything in particular draw you in? Appreciate the praise!
ReplyDeleteJanet, aren't many attempts at expressing to others that you understand them actually self-serving? Or at least, they can be. What did you think of his motives for trying?
Peggy, it definitely works that way for some people. I know I've been guilty of objectifying people in my life, though usually not sexually. That's my own dysfunction, I presume.
Michael, have you had grief with T-Mobile? Or was it something else about the references?
Sonia, do you think that is a worthy way to become more self-aware?
Danni, it's only depressing that I've touched on gay issues four times out of a thousand posts. Clearly I'm not playing to my Danni-related strengths?
Eric, it formed as a list. I couldn't have done it any other way this week; that's the shape it all came together in from the first dozen minutes of brainstorming. So glad you liked that shape.
This was hilarious. It had me literally laughing out loud. I loved the evolution.
ReplyDeleteThis was hilarious. Sardonic, ironic, perfect. Such a poke at the PC in all of us. Peace...
ReplyDeleteSO delightful.
ReplyDeleteI smiled all the way through this - I guess one of lifes lessons is to allow others to be who they are and for us to be allowed to be who we are.
ReplyDeleteI liked that the character become wise enough in the end to just see each individual as a person rather than a lable - but that he still labels the hot girl ones hot! LOL
Nice to see the emergence of tolerance and affection, both of which the world needs much more of.
ReplyDeleteOver time, opinions change as people change, and probably the most important thing to fear is fear itself (to use somebody else's line). A good story, John, with many applications to life.
ReplyDeleteMadison, did anything in particular get you to laugh out loud?
ReplyDeleteLinda, interesting, so you saw this as a rebuff against political correctness?
Max, everything turned out alright, right? Your encouragement to post it seems warranted. Are we still recording tonight?
Helen, so you like that he's still at least a bit of a pig?
Steve, it is never overstocked, too true.
Stephen, I do envy people whose lives are so tranquil they only fear the fear itself.
I think he does make some form of progress, and at least he attempts to move forward, but he does need to learn what things mean.
ReplyDeleteThere were great lines throughout this. I loved "A fistfight may break out." There's a matter-of-factness to the tone that's just perfect.
ReplyDeleteSo, some progress. I do like that our hero manages to stop thinking of "them" as "ones" and they become "people".
"Well, except for the hot ones."
A ways to go yet...
Well done on this, John. A lot of humor packed into it.
Like others have already mentioned, the progression of his line of reasoning is the best part for me, combined with the somewhat irrational sense of humor. Very amusing!
ReplyDeleteNot sure about more worthy (would have preferred it if he had happened on it by deep and careful doubt) but it involves sex and honesty with self which isn't a bad way to go.
ReplyDeleteHe seemed to have a strange obsession with his desk, funny that someone in his office caught on.
ReplyDeleteThis just kept getting funnier and funnier. Great stuff. You've outdone yourself.
ReplyDeleteIt was such a true story. People don't realize that gays are just like them but they don't find love in the same type of people. Very well written!
ReplyDelete