Embarrassing Moments

Hello, internet! This message is flying to you via the interwebs from the tips of my freshly nail polished fingers. I decided that indulging my delicate side and practicing my mastery of the English language would be an efficient alternative to actually studying for my looming AP French exam. In related news, I'm probably about to accidentally spill nail polish into the crevices of my keyboard. I hope you appreciate the risks that I take for you.

Earlier today, I was just on the phone giving my personal information to a stranger. It's not as bad as it sounds. I was orally signing up for a (possible) September volunteer position at a hospital near my house. Anyway, I practiced using my best CONFIDENT voice, which strangely makes me sound about thrice as much like a valley girl, which is a plus for me because I hate talking on the phone. I inquired about how one would go about signing up for said volunteer position and said something to the effect of, "Is there some process I have to go to to sign up for volunteering?" and the lady was like "Well, if all the places were full for June, don't you think there'd be a sign up list for September?" To which I sheepishly answered, "Yeah..." Then as I was giving her my name I totally forgot how to spell my last name and she was like, "It is your name, dear." To which I replied, "Yeah, I know..." It was the silly naming thing you have to do that confused me, where you have to give a word that starts with the name of the letter. Also, in my defense, the only thing the hospital website says is to "Call our Office of Volunteers for more information!" and gave no other information on how to sign up for stuff. So. Take that.

Anway, as far as embarrassing things go, this is pretty minimal (I'm not all that ashamed to know that an anonymous woman -- who admittedly knows my name and where I live -- now mistakenly believes that I never passed kindergarten), but my desire to share it with somebody does remind me of all the many times when something legitimately embarrassing happens and it's only made better if there is a friend (or anyone non-judgmental) with whom you can laugh it off. Like, in your head, you know that you shouldn't be that embarrassed by something, but until you can vocally acknowledge that you did something silly, the weight of the embarrassment just sort of weighs down on you. You know what I mean? It's like we all have to prove that we can laugh at ourselves, or maybe we just want confirmation that it really wasn't that big a deal. Or maybe we want the strangers watching at us all judgmental-like to know that we are normally functioning creatures of society because look, we have friends! That's normal! I'm not sure why most people (myself included) react this way. It's just this incredible urge to share that experience with someone. Falling down the stairs (provided you don't actually hurt yourself) is really shameful when you're alone, but when a friend laughs with you, it's suddenly hilarious.