Awkward Eye Contact

I was writing on the GO train the other day and was having trouble with the idea I was working on, so I looked up from my page, around the train. As I looked around the train, I made eye contact with a boy who was probably around sixteen. That happens on trains because there are people facing frontwards and backwards. I looked back to my writing without thinking about it. I looked up again a while later and made eye contact with the same boy. This time, he smiled. I smiled back, or rather, I looked a bit puzzled. It was then that I realised that he thought I was looking at him purposefully. This is what happens when you make awkward eye contact.

I often run into the issue of awkward eye contact when I’m dancing at bars. I never know where to look. I can only look at my friends for so long before it gets weird, and staring at the lights causes blindness, so usually I look around the bar. This can be a lot of fun, of course, especially if I’m lucky enough to have a few embarrassing couples or flailing dancers around me. (Autocorrect changed flailing to falling. That’s fun to watch too, but makes me feel like a bad person after a while.) The problem is, sometimes I make eye contact with guys who think I’m looking at them with real purpose. They end up approaching me thinking that I’m interested, when I am not looking with interest of any sort. I am simply looking around and happened to make unfortunate eye contact. This has happened so many times, I now shake my head after making such eye contact to say ‘No, I am not looking at you’, in an attempt to prevent any awkward interactions. Though the subject in question no longer thinks I’m interested, he thinks I’m crazy instead. But what else am I supposed to do, wear sunglasses at the bar to avoid eye contact? Try using Jenna Marbles’ signature anti-pick up strategy? Both would be effective but drastic, and I’d rather not acquired the nickname The Face in my final year of university.

The underlying issue is that looks and glances are often given meanings that they aren’t necessarily meant to convey. In bars, eye contact is thought to convey interest, and is reacted to in a way that will encourage or discourage subsequent interactions. To put it a little less formally, everyone thinks that everyone around them is thinking about hook ups. As a result, even those who aren’t thinking about hook ups and aren’t seeking that kind of an interaction react to glances as though they are exactly that kind of invitation. And as my experiencing with awkward eye contact suggests, often looks aren’t meant to convey any meaning at all!

So let’s get something straight. If I am interested in someone, I will let him know. No, I will not wink suggestively – I only know one person who can do that successfully. I will approach him and talk to him like a normal person rather than stare into his soul for a couple of hours hoping my meaning is conveyed. Alternatively, I won’t approach and I won’t seek to convey any sort of interest because the time and place isn’t right or he’s a married man and I’m not that kind of a girl. You get what I mean.

From now on, let’s convey meaning in words. Or, if words are too difficult, then sign language, smoke signals, anything but brief moments of eye contact. Let’s leave awkward eye contact for meaningless exchanges. Maybe once we realise that there is no meaning attached to it, it will become a little less awkward.

Song of the Day: Still by Daughter