I Fucking Did It

I Can’t Believe I Finally Did It

I Fucking Did It

If you’re expecting some bizarre sex god story about some guy who seduces ten people at once and starts shagging them on the spot, you will be disappointed.

I’m no mythical creature performing signs and wonders in heaven.

I’m just a guy overcoming his demons one at a time, and for me, every little victory counts.

I work at my college. A community college, so no wild frat parties, but a big community college, so lots and lots of people. My field of study is male dominated.

At the beginning of the year, I applied to the college for different positions as a student worker. Trying to keep my options open, I selected a very broad amount of jobs that I would be interested in. About a month ago, I received a call from the director of the Early Childhood Education program. I had unwittingly applied for “education lab assistant,” and she wanted to give me the position. I asked around about it and heard, among other things, that this lab, per the education (teachers) program, was basically overrun by girls.

I accepted the job. Momma didn’t raise no fool.

This morning, after classes, I headed over to the lab to start my shift. When I got to the lab, it was empty. The halls outside the door had a few tables and chairs, a cozy little place with carpet, but I felt like the girls were avoiding me for some reason. I couldn’t figure out if they were shy, if they hated me, or if they were just nervous freshmen.

I thought, “since I basically run this area and they’re gonna be coming to me for help, I should try to be more inviting, more gregarious. Maybe that’ll help them warm up to me. I should be the one making people feel at ease and at home around here.” But they had cleared out and I was alone.

I was down there for two hours fucking around on a computer and doing homework. When I got up and left the room to go to the restroom, I saw a female human sitting at the table beside a window, across and a little to the right of the lab door, hence why I didn’t see her from inside. Her back was facing the lab. On my way back from the restroom, I got a better look at her face.

Nordic, with a sharp jaw, upturned nose, and eyes so blue they were almost white. Auburn hair pulled back. She was studying but when I walked past she looked up and gave me a little smile.

I went back into the lab, sat at my desk, and started back screwing around.

I looked out at the exceedingly attractive stranger at the table, and really felt like I should go chat with her.

But imagine the approach anxiety!

Well I don’t know. Maybe you can’t.

You’ll need some context, so let’s tell you a little more about me.

I was raised in an unprecedentedly strict Christian home by overzealous, emotionally and physically abusive Pharisees, my lovely parents. Because the school system was ungodly I was what they called “homeschooled” but was actually “self-taught.” They had no hand in my education. In my ability to navigate a social environment. In my self-worth and self-esteem. I had no peers to communicate with, no objective opinions of the kind of person I was. I and my siblings grew up isolated, dejected, and malnourished.

As I became a teenager, I realized that I would have to enter the world someday, and, as someone who hated being caught unprepared, I went to extreme measures to prepare myself for it. I bucked against my dad, a tall, (although slim) and at the moment very intimidating man with a backhand that felt like it would rip your face off. I didn’t do as I was told. I kept throwing out that one day I’d be grown and he wouldn’t be able to stop me from doing what I wanted, and as I got older, he actually started to believe me.

The fact that I never interacted with strangers, coupled with the anxiety I had built up attempting to learn, made me so scared of social situations I would often freeze when asked simple things like my name, or hastily spew out noises that weren’t even words when addressed, dejected as my brain was overcome by terror and something in me just stopped. You want to know what severe social anxiety is? It’s peeing on yourself to avoid having to ask someone where the restroom is. It’s practically running away from a girl who was so evidently into you that it wouldn’t have been clearer had she simply said “fuck me,” because you just didn’t know how to deal with it. It’s puking all over the desk and floor during lecture even though you knew where the restroom was, because you were too afraid to walk past the front of the class and momentarily be the center of attention.

Now.

Imagine the approach anxiety!

It was suffocating. But I knew, if I just made that step, everything would be okay. Just this one small victory. I knew what to do. I knew what to say. How to make it an engaging conversation. Seeing a beautiful girl. Walking up and chatting with her. Possibly getting a date. I’d run the scenario in my head hundreds of times, but at that moment, actually doing it was unthinkable. It was always just a dream for me. I didn’t even know if sitting by strangers and chatting them up at college was socially acceptable. But then, why wouldn’t it be? I had the choice to make that dream a reality. And for god’s sake I almost didn’t. I almost stayed in that room fantasizing about what I’d say until she left. It could have so easily gone the other way.

But I grabbed myself by the balls, grabbed a handful of chocolate candies out of the bowl, walked right out of the room and up to the table, pointed to the seat adjacent to her, and said “do you mind?” loud and clear.

She was wearing earbuds, so she didn’t hear me the first time. I ended up having to repeat myself twice. I stammered I think. So did she. It should’ve been awkward. But it wasn’t. The moment was a happy blur. And one of the first things I noticed was that, she was happy that I’d decided to go talk to her, but also both surprised and nervous. More nervous than I was. And me trying to put her at ease suddenly made me forget about my own nerves.

“Do you mind?”

“Yeah! I-I mean, no. I’m sorry, w-what are you asking?” Hurriedly taking her earbuds out, fumbling a little although smiling broadly.

“Can I sit here?” I reworded the question.

“Sure!”

I plopped down and dropped the little candies on the table.

“Are you in ECE?”

“What?”

“Early Childhood. A-are you a student?” I stammered a little again but it was nothing.

“Oh no. I just came here because it was quiet, a good place to study.”

“Oh okay. Just asking. I’m the education lab assistant, so it’s kinda my job to check up on the students around here. You know, help them out when they need it.”

“So what do you guys do in there?”

Talking about the lab. She’d asked me a question. Good fucking sign in my book.

“It’s basically like the children’s section in a library. As a teacher you have to organize projects for kids, activities, study plans, etc. The students usually get assigned to simulate these types of things, and they use the lab to get it done. I operate the machinery, and basically know where everything is. So, what do you study?”

“Nursing.”

She went on to talk about her opinion of the program, how long she’d been there, what it was all about, etc. She was talking to me.

“Nice! I have a family member who’s a nurse. She’s a travel nurse, currently stationed in California, spending her days off on beaches and filling her Instagram with pics of them. I loathe her for it.”

“Haha I bet. You’re stuck here in little ol’ Illinois.”

“Yep. I’m stuck in this ratty old town.”

“So where are you from? Like, are you from this area, or farther out or what?” Another question.

“Yeah I’m from Davysville (not a real city). I live in Doetown (not a real city) but I say Davysville cause my family lived there for eleven years before moving. I really hate Doetown.”

“Is it that bad? It can’t be that bad. Well, I guess I wouldn't know, I’m more into the country. Not big on cities.”

“Oh nice. Do you ride? (Horses)”

“I own horses. On a farm! My brother has a cow farm, and I have relatives on a ranch in Texas.”

When she said Texas she sounded like Lauren Cohen as Maggie in The Walking Dead.

Ohhh! I see.” I cocked my head a little. “So you really are country?”

“What.” She laughed coyly.

“I think I hear a little bit of a accent. Like a, Southern accent going there. How cute.”

I wasn’t nervous anymore. My brain’s gears just kept turning. We talked about vacation spots and childhood adventures, hiking and nature, two of our common interests, we talked about what school projects we were currently working on. I told her about the four stroke process of a combustion engine, which I’d learned that day in class, with passion and in detail. She was fascinated and said “I’ll definitely be thinking about that during my drive home!” She asked many questions, smiled and laughed more than I did. I realized midway that I’d also had good eye contact, which to be honest was easy because her eyes were so damn pretty.

I went to the bathroom again and decided I’d get her number or maybe just her Facebook, but by the time I got back her classmate had whisked her away.

It was okay though. I was already over one of the largest obstacles I’d ever faced to date.

Tl;dr.

If a college kid with crippling social anxiety can do it, maybe you can too.

I’ll conquer this one step at a time. Wish me luck.