cyan's Journal: Proper Society

If you were forced to choose how you would die, what would you choose? It's a bit of a morbid question, but a rather fascinating one. How would you live out those last few days before you died?

My answer to the question is that I'd like to be sent back in time and be placed on the Titanic, first class. There's just something about that era in history, the way that people interacted with each other, that makes it unusually appealing to me. Everything about the Titanic spoke quality. The cutlery, the dining rooms, the Grand Staircase in first class, everything.

So, on the Titanic, you had the best of everything. You had classy people in a classy environment, and the whole thing screamed high society. To live a couple of days like that, to interact with that authentic, traditional kind of atmosphere would undoubtedly be the best days of my life. It'd be interesting to speak with the likes of John Jacob Astor and get his view on the world as it was then, before World War I. Or maybe play a round of cards in the smoking lounge. Or pay a visit to the radio room and marvel at a real, live spark-gap transmitter operating on 500hz (called "500 kilocycles" back then) and talk some shop with Jack Phillips and Harold Bride.

There's just something fascinating about this stuff. My interest in ancient Roman history mostly involves how "proper society" interacted back then. There exist these things called "renaissance faires" where the participants dress up in traditional Victorian outfits and act out various things one would do back then as a member of proper society. Lady Kalessia goes to these frequently, and is quite passionate about them. In one case, where I presume someone showed up dressed inappropriately for the period, she wrote a rant in her journal about how one should either dress the part or GTFO. I have a great amount of respect for her because of that attitude, trust me.

Unfortunately, as much as I enjoy watching the cogs of high society turn, I'm still just a working-class computer geek who struggles through a lot of social situations. I'm a lot better than I was ten years ago, that's for sure, but there's still a lot of work to be done. For the most part, the toughest thing is breaking the ice with people I don't know, along with dressing (and looking) like I belong. Most people think I over-analyze things like this, but, I'm a perfectionist and this is where it shows. I worry about just about everything: how I speak, where my hands are, how I sit, how I eat, and so on. Besides, do you really expect someone whose job title includes the word "analyst" to not analyze these sorts of things?

So, you can imagine both the excitement and horror of being invited to an event that is basically as formal as they come. The invitation included a coupon for a discount on a tuxedo rental. Originally, I was going to go this route and rent a tuxedo, until most people I spoke to said they were just wearing regular suits. So, not wanting to be the odd man out, I decided to wear a suit as well.

I showed up to the event on time, at 5:00pm, checked my coat, and looked around. "As formal as they come" doesn't do justice to how formal this thing really was. To give some perspective on it, my working-class self was the worst dressed person there, hands down. Virtually everyone else was wearing a black-and-white tuxedo, and here I was wearing a black suit with a red dress shirt and tie. Everyone who was there already could be seen milling around, chatting amongst themselves while immaculately-dressed waiters and waitresses roamed the room with platters of champagne and bacon-wrapped scallops.

So, here I was, by myself, dressed badly, and surrounded by very important people, none of who I knew. Nobody was talking to me, and I was too scared to talk to anyone else. So, I nervously stood around and felt like I was holding my dick in my hand for all of twenty to thirty minutes before I simply cracked under the pressure and went home. There was nobody to talk to, I wasn't dressed properly for the occasion, I don't drink liquor, and the prospect of having to sit down at a randomly assigned table surrounded by people I don't know and go through this whole routine again for six hours or longer was just too much.

To put it simply, I was on the first class deck of the Titanic, and I felt like an A-Grade Idiot. To say that I'm disappointed with myself is an understatement.