Gullible Girl

Once again, I've blown off doing tomorrow night's homework. It could be combination of laziness, exhaustion (I was at another funeral today, and those are emotionally draining) and lack of inspiration. This would be the second week I've neglected to do any readings or writing and I'm contemplating skipping class again because of it. There's a 90% chance I'm going to suck it up and just go to class unprepared because it's too expensive to not show up than to be embarrassed when you have nothing to present.

I don't watch alot of TV and one of the last shows you'll catch me watching is Gossip Girl. I'll admit, I've read the books that the show is based on -- that's as far as I will go in terms of the GG franchise.

Anyway, yesterday I spent the entire day driving around up north with my parents checking out some vacant lots I'm interested in purchasing. I had the intention of seeing 4 places, and end up only seeing one. I just want to say this: Google Maps is as useless as a blind mule. I will never use it again as far as long road trips go. Satellite mapping, my tired Asian ass. This is another reason to hate Google. And yes, I know that this blog hosting site is owned by Google, but I don't care. I JUST HATE GOOGLE MAPS!!

Okay, now that I've got that out of my system, allow me to carry on. So after a day of driving, my tired ass sat itself in front of the television for the rest of the evening and it so happened that Gossip Girl was on. Yay. I actually sat through most of the episode, not really watching it, mind you. I zoned in and out between listening to music on my laptop to checking out the clothes.

To summarize to those readers who don't watch or know about GG, it's basically about a bunch of teen-age "Upper East-siders" who are spoiled and rich and have poignant little lives. Think The OC meets Desperate Housewives. Anyway, the main theme of the story is that there's a mysterious "Gossip Girl" who know everyone's 'biz-nazz' and reports on a blog, which everyone in the school seems to receive "RSS feeds" to. Most of the gossiping is about the popular chicks, Serena and Blair. Blair is a bitch who thinks she's Queen Bee, and is probably rightfully so, because she's got these chicks who follow her around and wanna be her friend. Serena is her best friend who, seemingly equally rich and prestigious, isn't really bitchy and kinda down-to-Earth. While most people hate Blair, Serena sees the best in her and defends her and tries to maintain her friendship, which is usually having to put Blair on a pedestal because Blair can be cranky when she doesn't get her way or feels threatened for her throne.

So in this particular episode I watched, Serena is confronted by some chick, who having had a similar friend like Blair, tells Serena that she doesn't need to constantly try to please Blair and put her own self in the shadow to consider Blair's feelings so that Blair doesn't become cranky.

That soooo struck a chord with me because I totally related to it. For a long time, I've always been like a Serena: I felt I had to please certain people for whatever reason, defend them to other people who probably had good reasons not to like them and to put myself sort of on a back burner. I've noticed that with certain Blairs, I don't talk about work or anything else that gives any hint that I'm moving forward because it's just not worth mentioning and getting excited about around them. It will either be received by a very brief acknowledgment or a pessimistic opinion. I guess I've always felt that it was just easier to consider their feelings than to deal with their unreasonable qualms later. So I keep quiet and listen. I go on with my own life, seemingly under the radar, but somtimes that's not enough because those said friends are still not pleased with how they're being treated. That is not to say that I don't have genuine friends, who ask about my day, who get excited for me when I've accomplised something I've talked alot about or even offer to help. I would say the Blairs in my life make up about 10% of my friends.

It occurred to me though, that perhaps these said people just didn't realize what it is to be a real friend. Or they did, and just don't want real friends. Who needs real friends when you can have people grovel at your every whim?!

The sad thing is, I don't think that episode really opened my eyes. It just confirmed with me that perhaps I'm not the only Serena. There's a bunch of us who are naive to believe that these people deserve to have their feelings considered to an extent where you feel it is a burden on yourself but it's necessary to maintain the friendship. You can't really change those Blairs out there because this is what they're used to and really, it would be stupid of them to change because it would make them an equal amongst their peers. The only way to rid yourself of stress of having to keep a Blair satisfied, is to just cut them off cold turkey. I, personally, could never really do that, because although the friendship isn't necessarily real, it's still real to me. Make sense?

In the GG episode, Serena makes the gutsy move to give Blair the 'Take It or Leave It' Ultimatum. That is, Serena will do her thing and not let herself be overshadowed just to be considerate of Blair's feelings. And if Blair doesn't like it, she can leave.

I'd actually like to see how this works out between Blair and Serena, because it just might have to be my next approach although I really, really don't want to have to see it that way.

You know you love me,

XOXO GullibleGirl