THE SINCEREST FORM OF FLATTERY essays

THE SINCEREST FORM OF FLATTERY essays Im a flake. Make plans with me at your own risk because Ill inevitably let you down. You can count on me arriving no less than fifteen minutes late to meet you but that is, of course, if I show up at all. I do this because I am inconsiderate and dont appreciate you or your time. If you count on me to be somewhere at a specific time, Ill fuck it up and ruin your whole day. You may think Im exaggerating for dramatic effect, but consider yourself sufficiently warned. All of this may sound hard for you to believe I know it shocked the hell out of me when I heard it. It never occurred to me that I had this reputation or that for the members of my family, it was a long and widely held belief. Not because it wasnt like them to talk behind my back after all, Ive been a member of the Gillis family for 27 years and know thats how we operate. No, I just thought I was boring and my life too uneventful to have cultivated an M.O. To be honest, I didnt think they had enough raw materials to work with. Sure, I spent the better part of my teenage years holed up in my bedroom listening to Nina Simone and Joy Division, venturing out only to eat and go to school, but was that so uncommon? Maybe, but since I had no friends at the time, how was I to know? Although I was deeply committed to my sullen, agoraphobic way of life, I eventually grew out of that phase and went on to make friends and have boyfriends, therefore established myself as more normal, whatever that means. I thought I was living under their radar, but looking back now, I shouldve known b etter. I am the second youngest child in a family of seven kids and like many large families; we Gilliss adhere to the rules and norms of our own particular hierarchal social structure. I realized pretty early on that in order to establish and maintain my position in our organization, I had to learn...