The Silent Visage

Monday night was a great conversation, as previously mentioned. It's been a while since I had a good long conversation, where anything goes. I had forgotten the simple joys of uninhibited discourse. I learned a lot, about myself as well as about others. It was odd though. I've had similar conversations before with women and all of them have turned out one of two ways. Either one person or the other has been let down by the revelations of the conversation, or we've ended up making out. I guess this time was an exception. Maybe it was just indifference on one or both of our parts. I feel like it was because I didnt get a reaction as I have in the past. All I got was so much matter-of-factness that I may as well have been talking to a vulcan. lol. I dont think that is a bad thing, it is just intriguing. Never have I been so hopelessly unable to gauge an emotional response when talking about something as blatant as what we thought of each other. Maybe there wasn't one and that's why. But even if a girl I was totally indifferent about said what was said, I would most certainly betray something, even if it was only my indifference. Maybe that's why it was so easy to speak candidly, because I was less afraid of being judged. The initial rush was still there, when the tide of the conversation turned I certainly revelled in the anticipation, but at the moment that is usually the moment of judgement, where you discern the other's true intentions, the emotional level just flatlined as if we were talking about what we had for breakfast. The rest of the conversation was great too, and the second major thing that intrigued me was why it was so easy to talk about all this stuff. I am pretty open about my opinions, but that was the kind of conversation I would have with Lyndz or Trent or Amit. Completley open. Given the length of time that we've been "friends," per se, that was strange. She mentioned that she is an easy person to talk to, but the question is why. I hinted above that it is partially because she seems like she won't judge but I'm not sure that's all of it. It could also have something to do with us being kindred spirits in some sense. For example, her enjoyment of list-making allowed my to freely confess all my normally too-nerdy-to-talk-about list making adventures. Similarly, discovering that she once owned TIE Fighter made me much more able to talk about my sci-fi based nerdiness. Maybe talking about those interests, which I usually moderate except for the sake of humour in normal conversation, established a level of trust more quickly than usual and allowed the free exchange of information to move to other areas. I also think it had something to do with genuinely believing in the confidentiality of the conversation. My usual assumption is that if I say something to someone, usually it will find its way into the domain of general knowledge. There are only a few people with whom I trust information I would rather not have generally known. In this case, even though my gut feeling was not to say some of the things I said, I felt like what I said, even the things that might have been a little mean or off-colour, were in safe hands. I may be proven wrong in the future, but that would just be so..unlike her. I think. As mentioned, she's a tough one to read. I suppose that's another reason why it was such a good conversation. I don't really have a clear sense of who she really is at her core. Over the years I think I've seen a lot of different faces, and so she remains somewhat of an engima. From this angle the conversation was intriguing in the same way as a well-played game of bridge (which I have been trying to teach myself recently). I would play a question, and observe the reaction in an attempt to discern the hand she was holding. It wasn't easy, but that's what made it so fun. Overall the exercise wasn't a success, although there were some hints, her fundamental self still remains a bit of a mystery. It will be a great challenge to continue. I know that will sound strange because I have previously attested to the openness of the conversation, and it may seem paradoxical that I was stymied from this angle. However, the factual openness of the conversation contrasted with, at least on her side, an extremely well-fortified wall defending her emotions and motivations. It wasn't something that could be solved by "Ask me anything." because there wasn't a question that I could have asked, other than, "what are you feeling right now?" which would have been somewhat of a strange thing to say I think. I must confess that one of the ulterior motives of this post is to furthur this line of inquiry. Anyhow...that was the conversation that was monday night. A truly terrific bit of wordsmithing. Hopefully it isn't the last.