The More Social Network

Today, facebook gave me hope.

Weird, I know. Especially considering I hate facebook. Yes, I have one. Yes, I check it. Yes, I can defend both of those points.

I first created a facebook page in highschool, I think it was senior year. I remember my girlfriend at the time was sitting on the computer one day and asked if I wanted one. I said sure, why not? So she more or less made it for me. I remember her being mildly annoyed that for my profile picture I chose an image of a small baby screaming in a way that made it look as if it were in a fit of homicidal rage with a caption that read “For the Horde!”.

I thought it was funny as hell.

By the summer after my freshman year I had deleted it. Or maybe just deactivated it, because I don’t think facebook ever really deletes a profile.

However, when I started working on my film sophomore year (I go to film school) I needed a way to better contact my crew and cast. Seeing as how they were all my age, they checked facebook way more often then they checked their email, so I turned mine back on and have had it ever since.
I try to pretend that I really only use it to stay in touch with people, thought it would be obvious to anyone who checked my web history that I am on it more often than that. It also evident in the size of this disclaimer, which is now running a few paragraphs long.

And all of that is beside the point anyway.

When I was in highschool I hated it. Looking back on highschool, I still hate it. It was absolutely fucking miserable.

I went to school with a girl who, I have to suspect, loathed it much more than I was ever capable of, or could have justifiably done.

We’ll call her Val.

I didn’t know Val very well. If you were to ask me who she hung out with, I couldn’t tell you. And not because I have willingly let so many of my former classmates get lost in the cellar of my mind, but because from as far as I can recall she didn’t hang out with anyone. If you were to line up every person of my graduating class in front of me I’m certain I would be unable to find  anyone who knew her outside of school, considered her a friend, or even knew her outside of being “that girl”.

Val was small. Both short and skinny, which was exemplified by her almost all-black attire. She often did not look up as she walked, and when she did it was just a brief paranoid glance. You’d think she was just making sure that she wasn’t about to bump into anyone, but the terror on her face always made it look as if she was certain that something terrible was about to happen to her.

I never saw Val smile.

I remember hearing her voice only once. However, I cannot recall what she said, or what she sounded like. All I remember is being shocked at what I was hearing. Not from the content of her words, but from the fact that words were coming from her at all.

I recall a few girls that I would describe as cunts anyway saying she was mean or rude. However, I don’t doubt that they only felt this way because Val, unlike the baseball team, didn’t give them the time of day. I remember a few people saying she was extremely intelligent.

From what I heard (which is to say “what I heard in highschool” which is to say “what I heard is most likely bullshit”) she had, a few times, been sent to the office for refusing to speak when a teacher called on her. This may very well be true. The part that very well may not be true is that the school administration felt she was a threat to herself or others.

Highschool students tend to look at a girl like her and assume that she’s the one that will pull a Colombine. So, of course, rumors that there had been a “list” found in her locker, or that she had been seen drawing pictures of dead students circulated. I doubt any of it was based on fact.

Though most of what was said about her was fictitious what I believe to be factual is that she did not enjoy her time spent in highschool, I don’t know how she could have. It seems like all she wanted was to be left alone, and yet something about her was always said.

Today I was about to leave a comment on a friend’s facebook page when I saw her name under his list of friends. I was shocked to see it. Not so much because my friend was facebook friends with her, everyone is facebook friends with everyone, but because I never thought of her as having one. I went to her profile and saw a picture of a beautiful young woman. She is majoring in chemistry at a school with a very reputable science program. She has a boyfriend.

She is smiling in her profile picture.

I was happy to find her page. I did not know her well, or even at all. But it made me happy to think that things can get better. And that is a pretty nice moment in a day for me, because I generally think that everything just turns out  to be like a bucket full of dog vomit.

Masturbaiting On The John

Today, I thought about masturbation.

I had the entire day off and I have been pretty lazy about the screenplay I am writing. So I set out to play catch-up. I did get some work done, but every keystroke was a struggle, as my mind was elsewhere. I tried to hone into the minds of my characters in a desperate attempt to believe that anyone, anywhere, would ever consider reading a work of fiction written by me. More often than this though, I pondered masturbation habits.

I have many thoughts on the subject, as it is an area that I have found myself thinking about often. However, today I had a stunning realization concerning the connection between masturbation, bathroom reading material, the differences between men and women, and coprophilia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coprophilia).

As I entered my living room this morning I was greeted by my roommate Clayton. His attention bounced between Paul Blart: Mallcop, and a copy of Cosmopolitan magazine. Typically, I would find this unusual. Not the Paul Blart bit, as his taste in movies differs from mine, but the Cosmo. He obviously acquired it from his girlfriend. However, sleepy-headed, it first appeared that Clayton was attempting to figure out if Paul Blart was a good date movie based on Cosmo’s latest poll.

Clayton and I read through a couple of the articles. We found most of the suggestions on how to please men, or the declarations of what was “sexy” and what was “skanky” somewhat off-base, and in most cases just downright funny.

When I sat down to write a blog post about the varying thoughts I had pondered concerning masturbation, I had a cascade of realizations.

The first is that it’s probably unhealthy, at least somewhat depending on how often it happens, to use masturbation as a form of procrastination. Maybe not for everyone, but this entire blog is more or less an ode to procrastination, which means I do it a lot (does he mean procrastinate or masturbate?). Regular masturbation, I’ve read, is perfectly healthy, but I spend the better part of each day of my life procrastinating. Which means I am setting myself up for a pretty hefty mid-life crisis, and when I get there I’d like my dick to work and not be old and beaten in from all of my “wild and crazy years” of masturbating out of boredom.

The second was that I had read more Cosmopolitan articles then most other men. Now, I refuse to believe that it is uncommon for men to read Cosmo. How can you not have at least a passing interest in a magazine who’s every cover has the word “sex” written in size 86 font, bolded, and underlined? I would argue that most men have picked it up while in line at the store, or at their girlfriends house, much like Clayton this morning. However, I grew up with an older sister, and a single mother who dated. Every month there was a new issue of Cosmo at my house, and more often than not it was kept in the john. So, throughout the years I occasionally would grab it and read an article.

I then realized that women and men have vastly different tastes in bathroom reading material. I don’t proclaim to be an expert on the masturbation habits of our species, but it seems to me (based on a very small amount of research), that men, on average, probably masturbate at least a little more frequently than women. It is this readiness to rub one out at almost anytime that creates the bathroom reading dichotomy. A woman can sit on the john, push out last night’s taco bell, and read a magazine that spells out how to creatively maneuver between sex positions. A man, who partakes in the same activity will likely have a hard time not masturbating. Their pants are off, there is a full page picture of Anne Hathaway just a page flip away, and they just read about what the editors of Cosmo feel is the “best blowjob he can imagine”. It just adds up. Why not?

I don’t doubt that a woman has found herself with the urge to get one done while in this position, I’m just thinking that perhaps it would happen less frequently than with a man. And this is why in a man’s bathroom you are more likely to find a magazine on sports, or a book of “100 Greatest Your Mom Jokes”. Though occasionally I am sure the latter creates a similar problem, based on which one of your buddies you plan on telling the joke to.

I’m talking about MILFs.

It then struck me that perhaps men who masturbate while, after, or before taking a shit may be at risk of developing coprophilia. Or maybe they have the opportunity to develop it, depending on how you feel on the subject.

The smell of one’s own crap lingering in the air is probably not the biggest turn on to most women or men. However, if one found themselves frequently in a bathroom with reading material that compelled them to masturbate, they may ignore the smell at first. But after a prolonged period of exposure to experiencing an orgasm with that smell wafting through the air, one may be conditioned to require it in order to climax.

I don’t want to say that this would necessarily be a bad thing. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not into it, but if you are that’s great. I’m just spit-balling a theory on how your fetish may develop in others if not you.

At the end of the day I should have done more work. But if you are planning on taking a dump on someone please make yourself aware of any and all health concerns and have a premeditated plan on how to clean up.