#TBT, Cocktail Party Hatred

This is something I wrote before the Capitol Confessions ever existed.  It is actually one of the ramblings that made me think a blog might be a good idea.  Even though the circumstances of my life are very different from when I wrote it, there is still a lot of truth to it.  Thought I would share it with you on this Throwback Thursday.

~

Do you ever find yourself loving something you typically hate?  You know that thing that you always tell your friends you cannot stand.  Then, there is the exception, that moment when you actually enjoy the object of your typical loathing.  

For me, it is making small talk at a cocktail reception.  Don’t get me wrong, I love happy hour and cocktails.  Specifically, the situation when you are stuck in mindless conversation with people about whom you couldn’t care less.  After working all day, happy hour is supposed to be a release, not a stressor.  A big part of my job is fake smiles in-person and sweet reassurance over the phone.  When I am at work, I am “on” all the time.  When I leave, I just want to cut the bullshit and be myself.  I don’t want to fake interest for someone with whom I neither want to be friends nor sleep with.  Plain and simple, cocktail parties are the bane of my existence.  

Then, there is the exception to this.  There are times when I feel irrelevant.  Work is making me feel like the size of a pea.  I need an ego boost, a reminder that I can work the room.  There is an adrenaline rush to knowing only half the people at a party, a surge of confidence that I have not felt in quite sometime.  Nothing is better than finding a personal win when I corner the guy at the party who is avoiding me because we made out in college. I feel even more ecstatic when I realize he got fat.  

I then begin to think that I am the master of the cocktail party, and my party persona rules all.  So, I RSVP “yes” to another event.  I wear the perfect outfit, and head to work all vamped up for another boost.  Then, you get to the party after a long day at the office.  The same satisfaction I had at the last event just isn't there.  The wine doesn’t taste as good; the conversation bores me, and I wonder why I am wasting my precious free time with a room of practical strangers.  I suddenly hate being at cocktail parties again.  Loathing overtakes me and the natural order has returned.  

Why? I don’t need my ego stroked at this time.  Someday, I will despise my lack of importance more than I despise a room full of uninteresting people.  The time will come that I will need to be the life of the party, even if the party sucks.  Until then, I will go around telling all my friends how much I hate cocktail parties, and I will not let them drag me to one.