An Awkward Night at a Theater.

I’ve had plenty of awkward moments in my life. If you had a recording of my entire life, you’d essentially just have on your hands an 18 year long cringe compilation. For the most part, I’m pretty good at avoiding awkward situations, or at least, making them slightly less awkward. This is not one of those times. Usually just laughing things off helps, but this night in particular was just a catastrophe from the start, right up to the very end.

One of my friends had a part in a play, and she wanted me to come see the show. I figured it’d be nice to see her, and I knew a couple of the other people on the cast, so I figured maybe afterwards, we could all hang out a bit.
I rang up one of my friends to see if they wanted to go see the play with me, because let’s be honest, it’s kind of weird going to go see a play/movie alone. Well, my friend didn’t think the play sounded interesting, and told me he was too lazy to want to go see it with me, so I was to go alone. Whatever. It’ll only be awkward if I make it awkward.
Upon arriving, (late, I’ll add) I walked up to the man who I was to pay for entry, and upon looking at him, I tried to say something, but no words came out. He just kind of looked at me funny and waited for me to say something. For some reason, in that moment, I couldn’t think of a way to rationally construct whatever it was I was going to say. In the middle of my silence, I pulled a wad of cash out of my pocket, and looked at him and nervously said,

“How do I give you my money?”

They just slowly outstretched their hand and replied, “That’s be $6.” I only had a ten dollar bill on me, so I gave him that and said, “Sorry.” They broke the bill, and handed me back the four ones. I had just put my hands back in my pockets, and I didn’t feel like taking them back out to take the money, so I just said, “It’s fine, just keep it…as a donation.” They looked at me funny once more, but kept the money. Realizing how ridiculous that exchange was, I just sighed and walked into the theater.

Upon walking into the theater, I was greeted with not a single seat open for me to sit in. I guess this is what I got for being five minutes late. An assistant walked up to me and showed me my seat, a metal folding chair in the middle of the aisle. Oh well. I didn’t come here for comfort, I came here to see my friends. Beforehand, I had messaged the friend who told me to come watch the show that, “I really hope they don’t run out of seating, and I end up having to sit next to a bunch of old people for 2 hours.” Well, guess what? I did. I sat next to an entire row of older people, my folding chair blocking them. Everytime they wanted to get up, I’d have to move myself to let them through. I sat there, and texted this friend, “I’m in the crowd, I’m sitting next to a bunch of older folk.” She just thought it was funny.

To make a long story short, the show was good. My friend wasn’t in there much, but oh well, it was pretty neat. By this point, I was feeling pretty nervous and uncomfortable, so as soon as the show was over, I booked it. I walked out of the theatre at a brisk pace. When I got outside, all of the actors were lined up to greet everyone and shake their hands, as tradition. Being nervous, I walked by everyone pretty quickly. I tried not to shake anyone’s hands, because honestly I don’t really like touching people, and because with the amount of actors they had, I’d have been there all night. I told them, “good job!” and whatnot, but when I got to the friend that had asked me to see the play in the first place, it appeared to me that they turned their head away when I approached them. Did they not want to talk to me? I wasn’t sure. I ended up not saying anything to her. Further down the line, someone offered me a fist bump, and being the idiot that I am, I tried to be funny, and went in for the fistbump, then dabbed on them at the last second. It wasn’t even funny in the slightest, and I immediately regretted my awful life choices. I just kind of rapidly speed walked out of that building until I was in the clear. As soon as I left, I sighed in relief. That was incredibly awkward, and I paid money for it. Oh well, at least I get to go home now.

When I went home, I was greeted by some messages in a group chat. It was from the friend who invited me to the play. She said that she was sad I ignored her in the line, because she was excited to see me. “I thought you turned your head away from me?” I said. Apparently, she didn’t. And to make matters worse, she told me that all of those people that I sat next to whom I referred to as, “Older Folk” were actually her entire extended family. “Well that’s great.” I said. Then, another one of my friends sent me a message, saying that she tried to talk to me while I was there. I told her I didn’t even see her, but according to her, she was behind me the entire time I was speed walking my way out of the theatre, and she was trying to get my attention. I told them I was sorry, and I explained all of the other awkward things that happened. They thought it was funny, but I didn’t. I was pretty embarrassed. Although, looking back, I can laugh at it, and I’ve found that it’s a pretty interesting story to tell people. As a result, I’ve been able to get over that night of intense awkwardness.

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