If you would, please.

If you would please, just for a second, imagine yourself in a concert hall.

Imagine the shuffling of well-groomed shoes as the orchestra members make their way onto stage, filing into line as the chairs become filled. The hall starts to fill up with white noise as the brass players begin to blow warm air into their instruments, preparing themselves for the performance that is to come. Then the percussionists enter, putting themselves behind their respective instruments, their faces full of confidence and purpose. You notice the conductor off to the side of the stage, his eyes closed...praying? Relaxing? It’s hard to tell, but by the next time you blink he walks to the center of the stage and bows. His bow is a practiced one, one that betrays the youthful shine of his meticulously groomed hair. As he turns his back to the audience and raises his conductor’s baton to begin the experience, you start to wonder to yourself...

How did I get here?

Did you even drive to the concert? It’s all kind of cloudy in your head. Trying to find the way you got here is becoming more and more like trying to find a piece of foreign hair inside a jar of peanut butter, because that’s just how paranoid you are (Trust me, it’s there). Maybe someone drove you there, because you certainly don’t own a car, not since the accident.

It was as if an occult hand had picked you up and dropped you into this orchestra performance (which by the way, they’re in the middle of Beethoven's 9th and you are NOT disappointed). You consider getting up and walking out of the concert to figure out exactly where you are, but the stares of the other concert-goers quickly bomb that idea out of your head. The look in their eyes gives you feelings of alienation and anxiety...why is there so much hate? Upon looking around, you realize that these stares are shared by everyone else in the room, and immediately you become very self-conscious. Your hands start shaking enough to generate heat to warm a small family of anthropomorphic mice for the winter. Your sweat glands become more productive than a college student during the four hours before an exam. Is this an anxiety attack? No, you recognize these feelings...you’ve been in this situation before.

As your breathing catches up to your sympathetic nervous system, you manage to take control of your body. You slow your breathing down and manage to control the loud shaking of your hands, and as this process happens, you slowly start to put the pieces together:

1. You have no recollection of arriving at this concert.
2. The other concert goers share a large amount of contempt for your presence.
3. Despite everything, you highly enjoy the music being played.

And then all the memories come rushing back to you as you realize what happened...you look down to examine yourself, and find that you’re wearing a Stravinsky shirt. At a concert featuring the works of Beethoven.

Furthermore, you don’t remember getting into this situation because you had gotten mugged and given a dose of Rohypnol by a gang of music composition majors, up to no good. Their plan was to ambush you, drug you, dress you in Stravinsky attire, and drop you off in a Beethoven concert, in order to put you in the most uncomfortable situation possible.

Those bitch sacks.