Yes, I am Avoiding You

After going to my current school for not even a full year I have learned one very important thing. That is I've learned the art of avoidance.Back in high school, people weren't all that much of a problem. At least not too much of one. You could go home at the end of the day and not be pestered by anyone with whom you had spent those eight blistering hours of boredom. But even though I could do those things, I rarely needed to as my desire to avoid people was pretty low.

College is a whole different ballgame. I can say that with as much certainty as I say that I am male, lanky, and an avid fan of comic books. What caught me off guard about college was the sheer persistence of people. It used to be that if I didn't want to consort with a particular person all I had to do was take a different route in the halls. I wouldn't be hunted down, I wouldn't be repeatedly text messaged, and I most definitely would not run into said person outside of my living quarters. Like I said, whole different ballgame. It took me longer than I would have liked to adapt to these more persistent forces but you live and learn, and I have lived, and I definitely have learned.

The first few weeks of the semester are the weeks you generally make many shanty friends. I call them as such because much like a shanty they don't hold up to much. A mildly forceful wind blows or a light rain falls and you've lost a wall and your roof is leaking. Point being, that these friendships do not last long, which is contrary to what most participants in these relationships think. Common among shanty friends are phrases such as "I can't wait 'til junior year when we can (drink, go on double dates, live off campus, and etcetera etcetera)." They do not realize that most likely they will probably stop hanging out within two weeks and the so called "friendship" will be reduced to awkward nods when passing. I am telling you this because even though I'm aware of the weak-kneed endurance shanty friendships have, I still recognize their importance. A.K.A. I had them. I had several actually.

Though I knew plenty about the characteristics of shanty friends, there were still some hidden factors that I was unaware of. One of these being what's to be done if one shanty friend is ready to move on and the other isn't (guess which one I was). Unluckily for me this very thing happened and I had to rack my brain for solutions to this conundrum. All I came up with seemed extremely slimy at the time so I decided this was a grin and bear it situation. I mean college is only four years right? Wrong. Well, no it is only four years, the "wrong" was to the "grin and bear it" thing.

What was I to do? Well I had settled on doing nothing so that's what I did, until I realized I didn't have to put up with it. I came to the conclusion that I didn't have to muscle through hangout after mind melting hangout just to not hurt someone's feelings. That I could just slowly slip away, gradually over time becoming nothing more than a memory. While this sounds cool AND easy it took me a few tries to get the process down.

First try I had some small success. I went several days without having to see the person in question and thought I was well on my way to never having to deal with him/her again. Wrong. I soon learned that a cardinal rule in avoidance is, well, avoidance. This means not responding to text messages, phone calls, facebook messages, e-mails, and God knows what else. I was naive and thought that I could get away with a few texts here, maybe a wall post there. Wrong again.
This resulted in my being pulled back into the shanty friendship for another few weeks. It was awful.

The next time I tried I was firm in my resolve not to trip into the same pitfalls I had last attempt, but this was only a second effort. I went an entire blissful week and a half of without encountering him/her before discovering that like in most cases, the third time was going to have to be the charm.

Upon my third and last try I finally developed enough determination to resist all forms of contact. Success was obtained. If that person was a limb, he/she was most definitely amputated.
I write this because if this particular shanty friend hadn't been so overly persistent I wouldn't have learned one of the most important skills of my life, and I appreciate that. But, I guess the moral of this is, if you ever run into any lack of communication with me, or you see me sprint away when you come on the horizon, Yes, I am avoiding you.