By: Tony

They come in all forms: the ugly sweater Christmas party, the themed birthday party, the televised event party (Super Bowl, Series Finale, Oscars, etc.), and the occasional casual mixer. The parties have phases that vary in levels of agonizing, and then everybody makes a vague excuse to leave early. “We have plans to check out the farmers’ market tomorrow.” I really don’t think getting home by 8:45 pm is going to make you enjoy looking at heirloom tomatoes tomorrow, Steve. Do another drop-shot and then shoot BB guns at cans in the back yard with us. Live your best life.

I should give a little personal history at this point.

For all of my adult life I have been a LARPer. That doesn’t sound like something that would ruin the enjoyment of a normie party, but LARPers tear it up. We fight all day, and then at night, it is basically one giant party with roughly 300 people. The event-goers range from soft, sheltered nerds from the Wholesome Midwest(TM) to the career degenerates that I associate with. There’s something magical that happens out in the woods. We’ve played live action Fruit Ninja with machetes, staged wrestling chop contests (complete with Rick Flair screeches), started cults, and banished thunderstorms as wizards. We dressed up in bee keeper outfits and made a giant bug magnet out of UV lights and pulled a swarm of bugs into other peoples’ camps. We once shot sugar cubes out of a wrist rocket at a friend who was wearing nothing but a cup. The list goes on.

When a person parties with savages, it becomes nearly impossible to behave in a manner acceptable to civilized, domesticated folk. You always have the creeping fear that you are one beer away from taking a machete to that tasteful fruit arrangement on the kitchen table. Pandora betrays you and sneaks in a Wu-Tang Clan song, and all of a sudden you’re shouting the lyrics a little too loudly. Jessica (a co-worker of a friend of a friend) is now staring at you, wide-eyed and speechless, like she stumbled into a clearing in the forest only to find some wild animal tearing apart the carcass of a deer. Does she run? Does she back away slowly? She can’t remember what her safety instructor told her to do, so she just freezes up and stares in blank terror.

Someone in the kitchen is trying to teach a table of gawkers how to play Smoke Or Fire with a deck of Baltimore Aquarium themed playing cards. You sit down and try to blend in. You casually sip your Trash Beer and talk about current international news that you learned from a meme. Then it’s your turn and you guess right and you’re up in Jacob’s face, barking for no apparent reason. You expect him to bark back, but he just winces and looks scared.

If this was a movie from the 80’s or 90’s, there would be a record scratch. The IRL version is much more subtle. People at the party just get quiet and slowly start avoiding you. This is because normies have a very limited understanding of the world, and concepts from outside of that scope can be terrifying. Fear of the unknown is a large motivator in the life of a normie. Maintaining the status quo in daily life requires constant attention. Those out on the fringe of society, digging into the creeping darkness at the edges of consciousness can come off as inhuman and ultimately overload the circuits.

A party can end up in strange places when you decide to just keep going and see where you end up. This is not the philosophy of a normie. Normies like their social gatherings pre-packaged with invisible boundaries and unsaid social rules. They like to arrive 25-45 minutes late and leave after 1.5-3 hours of enjoyable conversation, possibly after a lively game or two. Tables are reserved for snack bowls, and kitchens for preparing said snacks. They like to nurse their neuroticism on who will comment on what, and if they are dressed right for the occasion.

In my experience, you either arrive 2 hours early to a party to be as prepared as possible, or you arrive 2 hours late and hit the party like a jolt of pure electricity. Either time frame could be utilized for donning costumes, rallying the machete squad and buying discount fruit from the grocery store, or just blasting rap and smashing bottles in the driveway. You cannot afford to leave this party until it is has been declared dead. The rules and boundaries are usually declared by the host at top volume when someone is in violation of said rules/boundaries. Tables are a versatile item essential at parties for games, seating, and holding beverages (and yes, snacks). The kitchen is where people lean on the counter and ramble about existentialism and consciousness, only taking breaks for the intermittent mayhem that spills in from the rest of the party. The concerns and anxieties may still be abound, but are focused on bringing the right accessories and being prepared to hone your trashcraft at a moment’s notice.

I understand that normies are important in some way to how the universe functions, and I respect their perplexingly steady functionality. It doesn’t make them great at parties, though.