Countdown to Europe: Anxiety
I leave for Brussels two weeks from Thursday, and, while I may not have mentioned it before, as recently as last week, I was feeling very anxious about this trip. That anxiety is courtesy of Dirk.
He insists that we will have a good time and I consider him one of my best friends, so odds are that he's right. But I worry that he gives me credit for things I never earned and, given a week and a half of time stuck with just me and a couple of other friends, he's bound to find out the truth.
You see, he thinks I'm smart. And the problem isn't that I'm not--I know I'm smart--it's that I'm not nearly as smart as he is. With 14 years extra life experience, the equivalent of a Master's Degree, and an expensive German (read: non-American) education, he's got me licked, and you'll have to take my word that I'm not being too hard on myself.
Early in our friendship, he actually made me cry because I felt so stupid after talking to him on the phone. This was after he quizzed me on world leaders and made me list multiples of 3 until I was in 5-digit numbers (what?). I wasn't sure if I was crying because he was so abrasive (and arrogant!) to try to quiz me or because I knew that there was no excuse for me to not know that the President of Germany is Horst Koehler (yes, I had to look that up just now).
Last week, Dirk and I were talking about his postman, of all people. He said, "Postman would call me his friend, but he is not my friend. Because my friends have more substance to them." And he told me a story about the postman inviting Dirk and his girlfriend over for dinner and Dirk declining, causing his girlfriend to later exclaim, "Thank God! What would we have talked about with him? He has the intelligence of a hamster."
I told Dirk that I didn't think intelligence should be the lone factor in determining if someone is worth being your friend. I pointed out all of the American soldiers he and I met in Wurzburg in April. I said that they were good guys, fun guys, but not necessarily smart.
"That's true," said Dirk. "And I could talk to them about the Army because I'm an Army guy as well." (Dirk is German but he holds the rank of Major in the British Army.)
"But you only want to talk about the Army for so long," he said. "After that, what is there to talk about? You can't discuss politics with them--they probably wouldn't even know who the leader of Germany is."
Right-o.
And this makes me anxious.
And yet, somehow, I'm not anxious at all. Somehow I'm looking forward to having a relaxing holiday. Because, while Dirk might learn in those ten days that I'm an idiot who had to look up who the President of Germany is (Horst Koehler!), it's possible that what is implicit here is that I am smart. Okay, maybe my knowledge of world leaders is as embarrassing as George W. Bush's and my math skills are a little rusty, but intelligence is so much more than this. Dirk, being the smart guy that he is, has probably figured that out.
But there's really only one way to know, and in two and a half weeks, I'll test my theory. Surprisingly, I'm not the least bit anxious.
He insists that we will have a good time and I consider him one of my best friends, so odds are that he's right. But I worry that he gives me credit for things I never earned and, given a week and a half of time stuck with just me and a couple of other friends, he's bound to find out the truth.
You see, he thinks I'm smart. And the problem isn't that I'm not--I know I'm smart--it's that I'm not nearly as smart as he is. With 14 years extra life experience, the equivalent of a Master's Degree, and an expensive German (read: non-American) education, he's got me licked, and you'll have to take my word that I'm not being too hard on myself.
Early in our friendship, he actually made me cry because I felt so stupid after talking to him on the phone. This was after he quizzed me on world leaders and made me list multiples of 3 until I was in 5-digit numbers (what?). I wasn't sure if I was crying because he was so abrasive (and arrogant!) to try to quiz me or because I knew that there was no excuse for me to not know that the President of Germany is Horst Koehler (yes, I had to look that up just now).
Last week, Dirk and I were talking about his postman, of all people. He said, "Postman would call me his friend, but he is not my friend. Because my friends have more substance to them." And he told me a story about the postman inviting Dirk and his girlfriend over for dinner and Dirk declining, causing his girlfriend to later exclaim, "Thank God! What would we have talked about with him? He has the intelligence of a hamster."
I told Dirk that I didn't think intelligence should be the lone factor in determining if someone is worth being your friend. I pointed out all of the American soldiers he and I met in Wurzburg in April. I said that they were good guys, fun guys, but not necessarily smart.
"That's true," said Dirk. "And I could talk to them about the Army because I'm an Army guy as well." (Dirk is German but he holds the rank of Major in the British Army.)
"But you only want to talk about the Army for so long," he said. "After that, what is there to talk about? You can't discuss politics with them--they probably wouldn't even know who the leader of Germany is."
Right-o.
And this makes me anxious.
And yet, somehow, I'm not anxious at all. Somehow I'm looking forward to having a relaxing holiday. Because, while Dirk might learn in those ten days that I'm an idiot who had to look up who the President of Germany is (Horst Koehler!), it's possible that what is implicit here is that I am smart. Okay, maybe my knowledge of world leaders is as embarrassing as George W. Bush's and my math skills are a little rusty, but intelligence is so much more than this. Dirk, being the smart guy that he is, has probably figured that out.
But there's really only one way to know, and in two and a half weeks, I'll test my theory. Surprisingly, I'm not the least bit anxious.