I am admittedly one of the most awkward human beings on the face of the earth. Fortunately, I tend to mask my awkwardness to the point that, if you saw me on the street, you would not realize the extent of my problem. However, my true colors come out when I walk to class. I always seem to get myself into the most absurd predicaments, all of which end with my cheeks flushed and head shaking in shame.
I always try to hold the door for people when I walk in and out of buildings because I think that it is a courteous thing to do. However, I always seem to do it wrong, no matter how good my intentions are. Either I hold it for too long, forcing whoever is behind me to scurry forward like an overweight prairie dog, or I accidently slam the door in the person’s face because I judged them to be too far away to warrant holding the door for them. In both cases, I look like an idiot and tend to walk away as quickly as possible in order to get far ahead of the person behind me.
When it snows, I, like the rest of campus, struggle to remain upright due to the treacherously polished sidewalks that pave our campus. This large, slick and watery death trap has been the source of some of my most awkward moments and for that I have become slightly resentful towards ice. When walking to class after the sidewalks have frozen over, I almost always fall. I then do the awkward recovery that looks more like a small child kicking me in the shins than me trying not to fall. I proceed to walk the rest of my way to class with a gait more akin to that of a penguin’s than a person’s. We all do this, but especially those who are not from regions of the country where snow and ice abound. You can tell that a student comes from somewhere warm because he or she will walk with a special caution that those of us who grew up with bruised tail bones have long since abandoned.
Any non-pedestrians on campus also tend to panic me in ways I cannot describe.
Given the deep-rootedness of my awkward tendencies, it is not surprising that I am at my most awkward when a cyclist or scooterist is careening towards me with no visible intentions to slow down, change directions, or stop. I instantly panic and being weaving back and forth non-committedly, elevating the small problem to a full-scale potential catastrophe. In the end I usually just jump into the grass or street, because apparently my safety is much better off in the gutter of the streets of Laramie than on the sidewalk faced with a person on a razor scooter.
As you can see, my awkward tendencies are only magnified by the act of walking to class. Seemingly mundane activities like holding the door or navigating ice become events that nearly always embarrass me to no end. But, while I always blush six different shades of red after I slip on the ice, I take comfort knowing that I am just one in a sea of many penguins headed off to learn something meaningful.
