It happened again today.<\/p>\n
A couple of weeks ago, a girl sitting next to me in psych class turned toward
\nme before the lecture began. It’s a big class, maybe not big for university
\nstandards, but big for the college I attend. I sat on the front row in the
\nmiddle, my customary seat in any classroom, the first day of class, but I was
\nlate for several class periods following that, and someone took my seat. In
\nfact, I’m late for psych class most of the time. Public Administration is
\nright beforehand, and I usually get in a conversation with my professor and
\nat least one other class member afterward. If I leave early enough, I’ll
\nstop and chat with other people along the way, so either way, I’m almost
\nnever on time for psychology. Many days see me hauling butt across the quad
\nto get to the library, where my classroom is. At least I get my exercise,
\nright?<\/p>\n
In any case, because I’m almost always late, I never sat in the same seat
\ntwice for the first month of school. I never could remember which seat I sat
\nin last, and even if I did, there’d usually be someone in it that I’d
\ndisplaced last time. I’ve sort of laid claim to a seat over to the left
\nabout half way back now, but I still just slide into the first available one
\nif the lecture is already in progress. This particular day, however, I
\nmanaged to get to class before the professor started teaching and sit in the
\ndesk next to the girl, who turned toward me and asked, “Do you have a sister
\nthat goes here?” This surprised me because 1) I’d never noticed her before
\nand didn’t recognize her from anywhere, 2) not many people know that my
\nsister attends the same school I do, 3) my sister and I don’t look anything
\nalike, and 4) no one I didn’t know already ever talks to me in that class
\n(even those who do know me don’t talk to me on a regular basis).<\/p>\n
I looked at her and answered, “Yes.”<\/p>\n
“Does she have a class with Dr. Allums?” she pressed. I again answered in
\nthe affirmative. “Well,” she looked triumphant, “your sister is in that
\nEnglish class with me.”<\/p>\n
“I’m sorry,” I said.<\/p>\n
“Your sister is in that English class with me,” she repeated, thinking I
\nhadn’t heard.<\/p>\n
I nodded. “I know. I’m sorry.” She looked taken aback. Then she laughed
\nnervously, and the lecture began.<\/p>\n
Afterward, I asked her what her name was and told her mine. “Holly,” she
\nsaid.<\/p>\n
“Holly,” I repeated, then added, “I’ll forget that.” No sense in building up
\nfalse expectations in people. That’s what I always say. I’m terrible with
\nnames, and just because I ask someone what their’s is doesn’t mean I’m going
\nto remember it.<\/p>\n
My sister came home that day and gave me an odd look. Come to think of it,
\nmy sister is always giving me odd looks. That would seem to make them not so
\nodd, but she doesn’t look at other people that way very often, so maybe it
\nstill qualifies them as odd. She told me that a girl in her English class
\nhad met me that day and given her a strange report of me. I laughed and
\nrefused to deny any of it.<\/p>\n
But it happened again today.<\/p>\n
I ran across campus again in time to find out we’re still studying about
\npsychological disorders. Today the professor outlined the symptoms of
\nschizophrenia and anti-social personalities, also known as sociopaths.
\n Sociopaths have no conscience. They can do anything without feeling any
\nguilt or remorse. They can lie without becoming nervous and so pass
\npolygraph tests flawlessly. They’re thrill seekers and love breaking rules
\nand getting away with it. So after hearing all about schizophrenia and now
\nanti-social personalities, I was doing a lot of self examination. The class
\ntime came to a close, so I turned toward Holly, whom by seemingly mere chance
\nI was sitting next to again, and said, “It’s scary to hear about this
\nstuff…”<\/p>\n
“Yeah!” she agreed hastily.<\/p>\n
“…and think, gee, that sounds a lot like me,” I continued.<\/p>\n
Her eyes got wide. “Uh,” she stuttered, “oh.” Then she laughed again.
\n Nervously.<\/p>\n
My sister greeted me when I walked in the door this afternoon. Then she
\ntried not to smile. I could tell what she was thinking. “What did she say?”
\nI laughed.<\/p>\n
“What’s her name, Holly?” my sister said, “Yeah, she came into class today
\nand told me, ‘Your sister is really crazy!'”<\/p>\n
I doubled over in laughter and then asked, “Well? What did you say?”<\/p>\n
My sister smiled and answered, “‘I know.'”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
It happened again today. A couple of weeks ago, a girl sitting next to me in psych class turned toward me before the lecture began. It’s a big class, maybe not big for university standards, but big for the college I attend. I sat on the front row in the middle, my customary seat in…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-396","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nonclassified-nonsense"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nachzen.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nachzen.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nachzen.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nachzen.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nachzen.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=396"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nachzen.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nachzen.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=396"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nachzen.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=396"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nachzen.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=396"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}