A Jackass Move

When I’m at a bar or in any other crowded situation I always feel as if I’m in the way of everyone there. I try to make myself as small as possible by concaving my chest, sucking in my stomach, and keeping my arms pinned flat either to my sides or, by dropping my shoulders, in front of me. It’s really a depressing position to be in, and despite my intentions of avoiding contact with others, allowing them to freely move about, I end up getting bounced around like a pin ball. To further demonstrate this phenomenon, let me describe a reoccurring situation. I am walking through a crowed bar with my friends. Because space is limited, we are walking in a single file line, trying to stay as close as possible. Sooner or later we come across another group of friends doing the same thing. If their group is trying to cross the bar, and our group is in the way, creating a sort of T-bone situation, their group will inevitably cross in front of me, separating me from the rest of the group. I can only assume that they choose to cut in front me because of the essence of total submissiveness that I exuberate through my body language. These situations and others like it make me feel very uncomfortable in bars, but I have recently come to terms with that. I decided that crowed bars are just not the place for me, and that is ok. But despite this enlightenment I still find myself at these bars on occasion. This is when things can go bad, as they did this last Saturday.
I was hanging out with some friends at a local bar. As the bar began to pick up business I began to grow increasingly uncomfortable. Eventually I heard the bouncer tell the bartender that they had reached “one-in-one-out,” the pinnacle of crowed bar scenarios. I knew the night was about to take a turn for the worse. I could sense it in the air. All it would take was a simple twist of fate, and like a Greek tragedy things would feel just right before they all came crashing down. So it happened. I see a friend of mine, who I hadn’t seen since high school, come in the bar, I caught her eye and we were both surprised to see each other. We exchanged a quick hug and began to go into small talk. It couldn’t have been more than 10 seconds of conversation before it all came crashing down. I’m still not sure how it happened, but it did and that’s really all that matters. Maybe I didn’t have full control of my body because of the anxiety I was feeling in the bar, or maybe I was just excited to talk with her, but somehow, while moving my arms around when I was talking, I managed to elbow her in the face. Hard. A solid swing that connected my pointy elbow squarely to her mouth. I didn’t know what to do and she was not impressed. I’m not sure if her lip swelled up, but I would assume it did. That was it. Now I’d be surprised if she’d be happy to see me in another four years.
THANKS