A couple days ago, a friend called me "hard to read."
It made me strangely happy.
See, I come from a long line of people-readers. My granddad, my mom, and I can read people like we read cheap magazines. We've all got a knack for having hunches.Granddad was apparently never wrong about his first impression of anyone, and my mom's got about an 85 percent track record. I'm at a good 90 percent accuracy rate, and like most things, it's always better when you don't have to think about it. You just keep yourself open and observant, take into account people's voices and their tones and their body language and create a full picture of just who this person is and what his agenda is. It's more fun in hindsight than it is in the moment, because while you may be able to really get a feel for a current situation, you hardly know what you saw in this person until it really comes out. Then, it's time for the requisite period of "I told you so," and you go on your merry way.
So having some insider knowledge on the world of sensitive people, I've always unconsciously constructed this vaguely mysterious facade. You probably wouldn't know it from just looking at me; I've got a super expressive face, but my expressions are sort of screwed up. I laugh when something's funny, but I also laugh when I'm nervous, or uncomfortable, or don't know what else to say. I don't really frown, I just lower my eyelids a bit and glare. It's all in the eyes, with me. You know how they always say you can spot a fake smile from a real one by the lack/presence of crow's feet around the eyes? Well I've cultivated a certain eye-squint when I smile, so that no matter if it's real or fake, it looks as real as possible. But it goes so much deeper.
I'm hardly the type to tell someone anything negative directly to his face. I'm the type who will answer any question if you ask me directly, but otherwise, I tend to hedge. Even if I'm steaming mad, and you need to change your ways and repent, I'll be like "You might want to maybe think about possibly getting your life together."
It's not like I'd rather not share my feelings; I've been getting increasingly confident in my competency throughout the past year or two, so I have a wealth of feelings to share. It's more like there's a certain social capital in being liked. I'm very sensitive to dynamics between people and relationships, so I never want to expressly make an enemy unless there's nothing positive to gain by making a friend. So even if I hate someone, I'll tend to be nice and tolerant and forgiving, just because that's the kind of person I am. The one, sure-fire way to tell that I hate you and ascribe as little value as possible to what you have to say, though, is if I blatantly ignore you. But even that is hard to read, since I'm naturally a bit absent and hard-of-hearing.
In short, it's fun to be mysterious. It's fun to keep people guessing and to have your motives and your feelings hidden from prying eyes. There's a certain politic, a strategy to being mysterious, and it's my weapon of choice in the social game.
What's yours?
