NTKOG #71: The kind of wishy-washy ragdoll who, instead of making independent decisions, asks strangers for input and bends to their every whim.
I am,: in everyday matters, often too picky to listen to the voice of the majority.
I am not: a girl who has a hard time making a decision.
The Scene: An afternoon in Harvard Square, spent bumming around and trying to write after a (very good, I think!) job interview. My only goals for the afternoon were to eat lunch and write about ten pages for a story I’ve been working on. Easy peasy, right?
After the interview, I hopped into Finagle and set up my laptop. When the clerk asked what I wanted, I only gazed at her with a sort of vague, salvation-seeking smile. “What do you think I should get? What’s your favorite?” Weirdly, she chose an everything with scallion, which is what I was going to choose anyway.
After an hour or so of writing, the employees got edgy for me to give up the seat I’d been occupying, so I drifted to Peet’s and made the requisite for-internet purchase. “Tea, I should think. I don’t know. You choose the flavor, please.” The dreamy cashier fell in my eyes a bit when he picked out two bags of boring Earl Grey, then recurried all his lost favor when he quite emphatically told me to get a slice of pumpkin bread. Yes, sir.
What with the exhausting task of writing for hour upon hour, I ended up stopping at Lush – oh Lush, how I love it – on the way back to the bus. “Bubble bar, please,” I told the willowy, nervous-cute girl at the counter. “I want something insanely decadent. Something that will make me feel more a god than a mortal.”
She actually blew me away by suggesting a combination of a melt and a bubble bar that I not in a million years would have chosen. To wit: Shy Guy, the cinnamon bubble bar, mixed with a super-luxe slightly floral oatmeal exfoliating melt. Smelling the two together kind of made my brain break, in the best of all ways. I fell in love right then, a little bit, is what I think I’m saying.
The Verdict: You guys! It was so nice to take a few hours and TURN MY BRAIN OFF. A+++ would rely on the decision-making abilities of strangers again. I should really do this again next time I eat out in a restaurant. It might help me get over my many irrational food fears. (Yeah, I’m watching you, cauliflower. Also: all of seafood.) Although, second lesson learned: I am perhaps the easiest touch in the world for a quick up-sell. Fiscal responsibility? Pah.
Going to continue the complete mental gooification now with a four-hour soak. Bliss.
Also, unrelated but completely wonderful: MEGA CONGRATS TO SISTER, who just landed an awesome new job!!! I couldn’t be prouder of her. Any company would be fantastically lucky to have her!
Not That Kind of Girl 