Friday, December 14, 2007

Mindless party nonsense; how I hate thee

Tonight was a very interesting indeed. My mother had the pinning ceremony for her nursing class (the fall graduates from the Nursing program). The after-pinning revelries were two-fold: First, faculty ate dinner at Red Lobster, and then we were all supposed to go to some guy's poolhouse and join the students for an after-party.

There were no kinks in that schedule.

It's interesting how much I dislike parties. I do not like public dancing, I do not like large numbers of moron Americans around copious amounts of alcohol, and I especially do not like blasting butts-and-bass music in the background while I attempt to carry on trite conversations with people who respond like they should be wearing an "I'd rather be shaking my butt to ths crappy music" shirt.

I do wonder why it is that the party scene bothers me so much. Beyond mild moral critiques, I simply do not enjoy myself. The combination of thumbing noise and shallow conversations wear me out. I'm not one who's ever done well with the concept of "just being", or the corollary "just doing". Things need to have a reason. I need to see what they're getting at, and consequently whether or not I should follow them.

Truth be told, it's odd to me that so many people enjoy the mindlessness of it all. Not really appealing for me. There's nothing at a party that I can't do a better job of with just a few friends.

Oddly, there is one instance where I found parties fun - seminary.

Yes, you heard it here first. Seminary shindigs were generally fun. Again, I have yet to formulate exactly why the difference is so stark. The loud music is there, as it the alcohol, but the internal culture of the participants made those experiences wholly other than what I encounter in the public sphere. Now for the arduous task of figuring out how virtually identical actions can be fun in one sector, and so bloody annoying in another.

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