I read a story a while back that seemed to introduce new characters all the way up to the end. I think it was The Confidence man. Truthfully, I didn't read it. I sparknoted it, and skimmed it. I just remember getting frustrated because new characters were being introduced the entire novel. By the time this book ended I had to keep track of more characters than people I've met during my entire life. It was exhausting.
That said, lets meet S. It didn't take long for his inner crazy to come through, in a remarkable way, and warrant a story on my blog. Somehow I knew that when I mentioned him today that something would happen to necessitate a story. S and B took me to go hang out with some girls that they had met earlier this week.
Now, let me give a small narratorial aside. I can't do justice to this story no matter how hard I try. It is so complex, that it truthfully is one of those had-to-be-there-moments. But I'm going to share it anyway.
Two of the girls were from other countries. One of them somehow became offended that Mormons always seems to talk about religion, which is a little unfair when one remembers that she is the one who started talking about religion. A better judgement might be that Mormons can't seem to stop talking about religion. While we might not start a faith-based discussion, we certainly won't let them finish.
Through this discussion we learned lots of fun little facts about her; such as where she is from, how long she has lived here, and her the present whereabouts of her boyfriend, who is apparently "way bigger than S, and has much bigger muscles, and could totally beat him up." I wouldn't call myself an amazing conversationalist, but I rarely allow a conversation to go from, "nice to meet you" to, "I'm gonna get my serbian BF beat the crap out of you" in under ten minutes. Apparently such conversational tracks are commonplace in countries known for their widespread tolerance of others. I'd forgotten that the spanish inquisition was just "harmless hazing."
One of the other girls seemed to get mad because she just didn't understand S.
S has the remarkable ability to literally carry on several conversations with multiple people at the same time. It is like his brain is a harddrive that he can section off, allowing different parts to work on one task while other parts are assigned to other functions. While this is a freakin awesome skill, it also seems to annoy people pretty quickly if they aren't used to it.
Within about 15 minutes two of the girls were so annoyed at S because they felt like he was just talking to them, instead of with them. Little did they understand, S had heard every word they said, carefully contemplated it, analyzed it, then responded. He is a freakin machine. If my computer could do as many things at once as he can, I'd never fall behind... ever.
So that is a small introduction to S. He is hilarious, and it is always worth a good conversation. There have been one or two times where I just go to his room, and mention something for the simple joy of hearing him speak. He can almost carry on a conversation with himself; arguing both sides of a topic like a true sophist. Once he has debated the merits of both sides of the argument, I politely withdraw with a smile on my face knowing that I've been edified and learned something useful.
My complaint comes from people who get so hostile so quickly. Why? Neither of those girls were even moderate conversationalists, they both had terrible personalities, and...and... you know what? I really want to go on, but I just felt like I ran into a wall. haha. I wasn't tired at all, and it just hit me. So give a warm welcome to S, and know that I'll be posting another story soon.
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