I’ll be the first to admit that I am a massive coward. Life is scary, and we’re all just surviving one horrific episode to the next until we die of old age, or something is sufficiently scary that our heart explodes.
This is especially true when it comes to women. They are terrifying and trying to talk to them is the social equivalent of when you’re leaning back on a chairs hind legs and you go just that bit too far and feel yourself start to fall backwards and are suddenly faced with your own mortality. Anyone who says otherwise is a filthy liar.
If it weren’t for my fortunate position of being a half-decent Cheerleader I would probably be entirely starved of human intimacy and be well on my way to amassing an army of ferrets (cause Cats kinda suck). Cheerleading forces females to be in the same room as me, and it has been brought to my attention that maybe I am taking this fact for granted. My best friend, and career pessimist, said to me the other day;
“I can’t wait until you stop Cheerleading and have to go and meet women out in the real world, in bars and clubs like the rest of us, and you have absolutely no idea how to do that. Regular girls don’t care that you’re good at Cheerleading.”
It was a nice reminder that the clock on my sex life is directly correlated to my bodies capacity to hold a girl above my head. I started eating more fruit that day.
Insecurity is one of the constants that binds us as humans. We are most aware of these insecurities when we are at our most vulnerable, which for the majority of us is when we are in a position to be told “no”. For me, this is approaching strangers.
If you’re ever wondering if I’m feeling a touch vulnerable, watch to see if I run my hand through my hair. Odds are there’s someone attractive nearby whom I believe cares if my hair is scruffy or not.
My family and I are currently on holiday in Vietnam. Two nights ago the resort had a cocktail function for all it’s guests, so management could mingle and get to know their customers. Being a high-end resort in a literal paradise, my brother and I (23 and 25 years old respectively) are about 30 years below the average age of the people here. We took this opportunity to have some free drinks, ignore everyone, and follow the guys holding the canapés around until they gave up and just left the tray at our table.
For those who don’t know, my brothers name is William (aka. Bill, Bill Bailey, Bilbo Baggins, The Bill O’ Rights, Sonny Bill Billiams, and The Beach Monster) and he has Down Syndrome. My homie with the extra chromie has always been my partner in crime, and we have a blast together.
He also is way into girls.
That horny little bastard managed to instantly locate the only females of a roughly equivalent age at this function and never looked back. We realised at one point that Bill had gone to hunt down more fried calamari and hadn’t come back. A quick scan of the room and we found him; beer in one hand, massive bollocks in the other, chatting up a pair of attractive twenty-something blondes. I was equal parts proud and envious.
If someone with the mental capacity of an 8 year old can have that much game, why can’t I?
Even as my mother incessantly told me to go and save him, I realised that The Bill didn’t need saving. He wasn’t nervous or shy or afraid. Apparently that third copy of Chromosome 21 contains the confidence that a lot of us lack when trying to converse with prospective mates.
I’ve learnt three life lessons from Will in the past 23 years:
1. People don’t notice a kid with Down Syndrome consistently shoplifting bags of chips
2. Maroon 5 have been putting out a constant stream of bangers for fifteen years
and finally…
3. Give a kid a beer and an extra chromosome and he’ll conquer the world.
We never did manage to get the room numbers of those girls, but hey, the trip is still young and so are we.
Dear Josephine.. 
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