Today's forecast calls for trite with a smattering of awkward

The guy who directed the oh-so-prophetic production of Stop Kiss I was in my senior year (more on this later) once made the off-hand comment that invariably, everyone talks about the weather. "That's not true," I protested "I never talk to people about the weather - that's so lame!"

Of course, once my attention was brought to it, I realized that, I did, in fact talk about the weather. Kind of a lot. And the more I thought about it, the more often I did it. Because now that it was in my head, whenever I reached an awkward pause in a conversation, my brain would naturally go into panic mode, lose the ability to form any original thoughts and I'd have to revert to the weather. It was a self-perpetuating habit.

Fast forward to today. The office I've been temping at for the last week does not have a system where guests' names can be put on a list at the front desk, so I have to go down 26 flights and get them. Which I don't mind, except that in the elevator on the way up, you have to think of what to talk about with this perfect stranger, with whom you are only going to have about a 60 second interaction. What do I bring up? Three guesses and the first two don't count...You got it! The weather. In fact, I am fairly certain that I have talked about the weather a grand total of 5 times in as many hours today. Maybe even more.

I don't know what I think about this. Part of me wishes that I had the balls to just be totally friendly and try to get to know them in the space of an elevator ride - "Where'd you grow up?" "Do you have children?" "What do you think about primary?" But that, I realize would both make people really uncomfortable and have everyone in the office thinking that I was a kook. Which I am, but in a different way...anyway. My other potential option would be to just go for comfortable silence. Which I sort of do do at times. Except that it's not really "comfortable" - more the kind of silence where you are suddenly extremely aware of where you're looking and what you're doing with your hands. You know, standard elevator behavior.

My third option, which I just came up with thanks to writing this post is to simply take it as it comes and then (wait for it, wait for it)...just let it go. Whaaat? Don't analyze it to death?? Don't worry about being awkward because thinking about it simply makes it more awkward? What a thought! I pick choice number three, please.

Now this is a realization I have come to possibly a half a million times in my life and yet, I keep having to remind myself. Which is funny, because when I do manage to let go of things and just take life as it comes, I'm invariably happier. So you'd think it would be an easy habit to keep up. But no, Mr. Self-Consciousness is not leaving without a fight. A long, drawn-out battle of attrition. Dammit.