First Impression Gone Wrong

Today calls for a funny amusing story from the history of Hillary. Please try to learn some life lessons from my mistakes, and yes, I did take the picture in the village of the lady in the convenience store.

I think first impressions are extremely important, priceless even.
A first impression is an automatic reaction to a person taking from all the social information you have received from the world previously and creating a feeling.
Obviously, sometimes our instincts are wrong, but I do believe in love at first site.
I also believe that wearing something and giving the wrong message can make for crazy assumptions.
I have a case and point from college.
It was July and gorgeous. The whole week had been gorgeous with temperatures in the low 80s, clear, sunny, with a breeze. People were walking around singing “Summertime” and cruisin’ with their windows open.
All this great fun was happening while I was in school: classes, clinical, labs, community outreach projects. Summer school is intense. The material is condensed into a shorter time frame. There is a minimum 3.5 GPA to be accepted.
The week was finally done. My friends and I decided to take a much needed beach trip.
The Bronx does have beaches. They just don’t have any where were going to swim in.
We decided to take the day and head for some beach south of us.
I threw on a short skirt and tank top as a cover-up. I didn’t expect to be doing anything except hanging out on the beach in my bathingsuit.
And that’s what we did, me, Colette, and Maggie, but all good things come to an end.
We got back to Washington Heights while it was still light to catch a late dinner.
After dropping Maggie at her apartment, Colette and I decided to run to get food from the Grocery store to bring home.
We were still hopped on sand and sun, behaving like carefree co-eds when I step off the curb into the street and the wind blows sending my itty-bitty white skirt flying up. . . . . completely up.
We all have the image of Marilyn Monroe in her infamous street crate pose holding down her skirt.
I had less fabric to deal with and no time to catch it. My skirt was up and I was completely exposed.
“Oh, well. It’s just my bathing suit underneath.” I say to Colette and we run into the store.
What I neglected to admit to myself was, that while Colette and I knew I was just flashing my bikini bottoms, the rest of the audience, the people in the cars driving by, the group hanging out on the corner outside the market, did not have this information.
All they saw was a girl in a tiny skirt that the wind blew straight up.
After grocery shopping, we hop in Colette’s car, jump on the Major Deegan, and head back to our campus in New Rochelle.
Well, as college girls, you notice nice cars.
Then, sometimes, if the car if nice, you may just notice who is driving it.
Colette and I noticed a nice car, I think it was a new loaded maxima.
The car came up behind us. They got too close for comfort and then they swerved into the fast lane.
While in the fast lane, they stopped and matched our speed.
Now we’re thinking, “Oh no, this driver is crazy” and we’re looking, not to see if there is a fine man driving the fine car, but to see the punk that’s messing with us.
What do we see, but two fine men, trying to get our attention.
That changes things. They were flirting with their car.
It’s similar to body language, but it’s a driving language.
We all know that you can say things loud and clear with your car. They were saying “we think you’re cute and we want your attention.”
How could we pass up a pick-up like that? They received definite points for spontaneity and creativity.
I decide we need to talk so I write our number on the only paper I can find, a napkin.
We tried to hold it to the window so they could just read the numbers, but nine numbers on a napkin can’t be written very large.
Our only option was to ball it up and try to throw it in their window.
That’s what we did. Colette and the driver, Rauol, slowed to the same speed and got their cars as close as possible then Colette hurled the paper to the passenger, right through the window into their car.
That girl’s got some aim. She’s an all-star hurler.
When the guys called us up, I picked up the phone to talk to the passenger (it was unspoken that the passengers were going to talk to that passengers and the drivers would talk to the drivers), but whe I asked him what he liked to do he said, “Ya know, I like to chill, hang out, get high.”
WHAT?! Eeerrrrr. Screeeech. Hit the brakes. Get high? Did he really just say that as a pick up line? He said it was something we would have in common!
Big mistake. We don’t have that in common. I don’t get high.
The conversation was over. I passed the phone to Colette, who did hit it off with the driver.
However, when I got home and went to change into real, street clothes, I took a look at the tank top I put on in the morning and across the chest red “SEEDLESS.”
My housemate’s boyfriend owned a clothing company out of San Diego called “Seedless Clothing.” You can check out the link to see the type of clothes they sell (http://www.seedlessclothing.com/2007.php). He, Billy my housemate’s boyfriend, had gotten a big shipment of samples and had given my a whole bunch of merchandise.
Who could a girl say no to that?
It was then I realized that the big SEEDLESS message across my chest, probably was cause for the assumption that I smoke weed.
It wasn’t as idiotic a pick-up line as I thought. The guy had checked me out and made an automatic assumption about the type of woman I was.
I was a woman who got high for fun.
Except, I don’t and he got rejected flat on his ass for the assumption.
To add insult to injury, he assumed, I also was a woman who, if I didn’t live in Harlem, was comfortable there. Specifically, I was a girl who hung out in Washington Heights.
There are two sides of Washington Heights, one is very up and coming with professionals integrating due to gentrification throughout Harlem.
The other side is still rampant with crime.
I was on the wrong side running around like I owned it in my itty-bitty outfit with SEEDLESS across my chest.
Oops.
This is why I believe it’s important to understand the messages we send without ever speaking. An assumption can stick, it’s better to give an idea of who you are through what you have external control of such as clothing and also expand to body language and facial expressions to communicate.