Silver(f)ish and shine me shiny

I feel as if I’m at a film premiere.

My senses are being assaul­ted on a daily basis by spangled stars and glit­ter. Every­where I look there are shiny sur­faces and metal­lic reflec­tion. Every­one is inwardly plead­ing, “Notice me, notice me. I’m spe­cial. I’m shiny. I’m more than the sum of my parts. I’m more than this drab exist­ence. I may look like I’m com­mut­ing to an office job, but in real­ity I’m at the top of the show­biz stair­way, the bulbs under each step explod­ing into bril­liant light — an eye-popping blaze of sheer unadul­ter­ated glam­our as I make my way down to the stage and bask in the sound of wild applause. This isn’t merely an escal­ator — this is my route to fame, for­tune and adulation”.

My response is to get darker, attempt to dis­ap­pear into the back­ground of things. I’m at the point where even this plain white shirt feels like too much of an overt state­ment. God for­bid that I should even con­sider a pattern.

I want to hide behind my book and make no eye con­tact with people. Unlike them, I don’t want to be noticed. I don’t even want to con­sider myself as being any part of this suf­foc­at­ing parade of glit­ter and shine, which car­ries the stench of of quiet desperation.

I shall wear grey and black tomor­row, con­soled by the fact that those of us who wish to hide from everything often man­age to glimpse each other amidst the incess­antly scream­ing gleam­ing. There’s an unspoken under­stand­ing. Our eyes meet briefly, and we exchange a know­ing but weary nod of recog­ni­tion. For a moment, we’re reas­sured that we’re not alone. Not every­one pos­sesses the all-consuming need to be noticed; not every­one seeks to announce their pres­ence in such an over­power­ing way.

Comments: 9

    Every day I am reminded why my favour­ite idiom is the one about empty ves­sels mak­ing the lousest noise.

    Jack | 05.23.06, 10:08

    That’s loudest of course, not lousest — ever since my key­board has been invaded by ants I can’t stop think­ing about crawly bugs.

    Jack | 05.23.06, 10:16

    V: Really like your shiny new triplets.

    Jack: could your key­board be lousy with lice, not ants?
    Um… that’s dog or cat lice, obvi­ously, not head or body lice. That would be gross.

    LukePDQ | 05.23.06, 13:51

    Thanks, Luke. I rather like the tem­plate too, although since it’s a Word­Press theme I didn’t really have a huge amount to do with it bey­ond obsess­ive tweak­ing of CSS.

    Oh, and who’s this mys­ter­i­ous ‘V’ you’re talk­ing about? I have no idea. *cough* *splutter*

    Now, can we stop talk­ing about lice, please? I feel faintly nauseous.

    An Unreliable Witness | 05.23.06, 13:59

    But that is the beauty. When I have stopped wear­ing make up, when I have thrown away the nail pol­ish (with the intern­ally flaw­less, D col­our engage­ment ring), someone has noticed me. I can feel his eyes absorb­ing me from across the room even at the most crowded house party. I have found my own pil­grim and he’s real, he’s here, his eyes are all over me…

    cosmosgirl | 05.23.06, 22:35

    I’m feel­ing much too pos­it­ive to enter this state of mind at the moment, but I remem­ber it well.

    When the Manic Street Preach­ers’ Richey Edwards wrote “I want to walk in the snow and not leave a foot­print” he was por­tray­ing the thoughts of an anor­exic, but as a more gen­eral com­ment on the desire for anonym­ity I’ve always thought it was rather power­ful. Not a mil­lion miles away from The Beau­ti­ful South’s Paul Heaton singing “So empty at the air­port, you don’t set off the doors.”

    Hg | 05.24.06, 17:43

    I am notice­able, people notice me and remem­ber me. It’s a curse when you’d rather be anonym­ous. I long to be ordin­ary. Many people think ordin­ary is bor­ing. I find it fas­cin­at­ing and I think, as I get older and as soci­ety changes, I am get­ting closer to ordin­ary. Which is nice.

    snowqueen | 05.24.06, 23:57

    Beau­ti­ful.

    Clare | 09.27.06, 08:56

    ignored is the new noticed

    offendineveryway | 09.29.06, 16:21

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