Boulder Colorado: A small town in disguise

Boulder is a small town. Almost too small. But not quite. It's small enough that by simply living a regular, nonsocial life, involving occasionally venturing out of the house to restock on survival supplies, you're guaranteed a sense of community. And if you happen to frequent a few places, you are guaranteed to get to know your fellow frequenters. I went to a grocery store today to get some food for a dinner party and I knew at least half of the people in the store. Okay, that's an exaggeration. I ran into about 4 people that I knew or recognized from somewhere or another. And the problem is, half the time, I have no idea whether or not I'm good friends with this person or if they were the person cooking dinner who I saw through a window while walking my dog. Which makes for some awkward encounters. ("Do I..? I swear I know you from somewhere! Oh no, that's right, I watched you making lasagna through your window while I was waiting for my dog to finish crapping on your lawn." No bueno in terms of first impressions.) So the lady who gave me recommendations on the fontina cheese at the grocery store looked insanely familiar and it wasn't until I was staring off into space in line to check out, that I realized she was the woman who leaned across a table at a cafe to give me an answer to a crossword puzzle I was working on.

Oh ya, that's another problem. I have a ridiculously good memory for faces and names. And unimportant facts. So, for instance, I happened to remember that this particular lady, the fontina cheese lady, was writing down a text conversation that she was flipping through on her phone, in loopy handwriting in a pink journal. And that at one point, she called her husband to ask about what actor was in some movie. So I feel kind of awkward listening to cheese advice from this person who thinks I'm a stranger but actually I know quite a bit about her. I know that she drinks chai tea with whipped cream, that she has loopy handwriting and she's married, and somewhere, in her house, there's a pink journal with a text conversation scrawled into it. Just by soliciting dairy advice from an innocent employee, I already feel like I'm violating her privacy.

The worst is when I run into someone who was an acquaintance a few years ago but I was never actually friends with. That also happened today. It's winter break so all of the people I went to high school with are back from college and invading my town and my life. I was walking to Red Letter Books today when, in front of me, to my terror, I saw this girl (whose name I won't post because for all I know, she's reading this and once thought that we were great friends even though all we did was have a chemistry lab together once 4 years ago.) who I went to high school with and haven't seen in 3 years. Now this is the kind of person who I have deleted on facebook because not only do I not want to have to read her status updates 4 times a day about how long it's taking for her head cold to go away, but also because her presence was taking up precious cyber space in my cyber consciousness. But even though she too has probably not even had the smallest fleeting thought about me either in the last few years, if we run into each other (which I stealthily but laboriously avoided), we would be expected to pretend like we give a shit about each other. "Oh hi! Oh my god so good to seeee yyyooouuu!! How are you, how's college? Where are you going again? Oh right... And now what are you studying? Riiiggghhtt I remember that.... Coooollll well how's that going?" blah blahblah I don't give a shit. So I lingered outside looking through the sale book rack until she and her friend had thoroughly imbeded themselves in one section of the bookstore. I then very quietly snuck past them to my section and then realized that what I was looking for was actually in their section, I confidently walked in, immediately fixating my eyes on the dewey decimal codes of the books on the wall until I found my book. I even went so far as to appear engrossed in the back cover of Mrs Dalloway until they had cleared the section and I was free to go to checkout- thereby being forced to turn my gaze upward.

Now I'm not introverted. Or creepy. I'm actually really social. I'm one of those people who casually talks to absolutely everyone who crosses their path. But I just really don't like having to pretend that I care about something that I don't. And I'm not heartless either. I'm actually very warm. I'm just.... discerning, I like to say. And I'm usually so lost in my own little world that it requires an entire paradigm shift to genuinely relate to someone I haven't seen or thought about in 3 years.

Okay, so now that I'm done justifying myself, I can continue.

Unlike Los Angeles, where I grew up, you cannot go for a walk in town in Boulder to get some "alone time", a valuable commodity in my life. There's no anonymity in this small of a town.

I wondered, leaving the grocery store, if there would come a point when I recognized every single person in Boulder from one place or another. I guess I'll find out, because I don't plan to leave anytime soon.