How did you get so cultured?

SUPER BOWL SUNDAY!!!!
Yeah, I cannot recall a single time I've actually watched a game. I do remember the 1995 Super Bowl Half-time show with Indiana Jones though, which turned out to be a long (slightly confusing and weird) commercial for Disney's new Indiana Jones ride in Disneyland (which I still have yet to check out, I've been wanting to ride it since 1995).

And of course last year's Lady Gaga's AMAZING performance.

But other than those two, yeah I couldn't care any less about the NFL or the Super Bowl.

So onto-

Day 4: The best compliment you have received.

Ok, this one is too easy, so I'm going to switch it up to one of the worst compliments I've received, or maybe that's was a backhanded compliment.

It happened so fast and in such a weird way that to this day it just makes me laugh. 

Here's a little backstory. This happened when I was at FSU, and the other party to this story was a member of Sigma Alpha Iota, the all-female music fraternity on campus. (I'm not going to name names, but she did share a name with a famous11.5-inch plastic doll who loved pink.) Now my relationship with this fraternity was pretty rocky at the time (and still is actually) and as civil as I tried to be I mostly wanted to never see another member every again (except for Cameron and my other friend Megan, they are the only exceptions). Basically, I wanted to join. I did join but then had to leave due to a mental health withdrawal, and when I returned and wanted to pick up where I left off, I was denied, despite the group telling me that my spot would be held for me upon my return. Yeah, that led to a very upset me, and a division among the group, not that the group that sided with me ever did anything about, but I digress. (Jesus, it's been over 10 years and I'm still upset about this, that's how bad the whole thing was. Trust me, I oversimplified it for you).

 Anyways...So running into this girl while waiting for the bus was torture for me.

But, like I said, I was civil. While waiting for the bus, we engaged in mindless chit-chat and I mentioned that I was going back to Miami that weekend to see an art exhibit.

We then started talking about art. I told her that the artist I was going to see was inspired American Modernism and very much inspired by Georgia O'Keeffe. I then mentioned some of my favorites paintings by O'Keeffe and then stated that I preferred Post-WWII Expressionism and Pre-WWI Post-Impressionism.

And as I described to her what these movements were, because girly here had never heard of them let alone of Kandinsky or Matisse (If I remember correctly, she was getting her degree in Music Education, and while that doesn't really play into the visual arts, you should have at least have heard of either painter or at least the artistic movements, after all, they were the same in music!) her face just kinda glazed over.

So I finished my little tirade about art she says to me:

"Wow Gaby, how'd you get so cultured?"  or "Wow Gaby, you're so cultured!"

It was something to that effect, basically saying as a backhanded compliment. Like I said, there was tension between me and these fraternity sisters (yes, I know its supposed to a sorority, but these girls were insistent on being called a fraternity.) And add in the fact that I was the ONLY Latina at the time in my pledge class and the rest of the girls were all white. Now I'm not going to play the "ethnicity card" but I'm sure that was also an issue of contention with them.

Now I know what you're wondering, "Gabs, what was your response!"

I just turned to her, smiled, and said: "Oh, I thought everyone knew that or did you not take history in school?"

Yeah, she was not to keen on my response. She then ignored me until the bus came for us, we sat in separate rows.

That weekend when I told my mom, she didn't know whether to laugh or find the girl to beat the shit out of her.

Today, we use it as a joke. Anytime anyone is ever impressed (or intimidated) by my knowledge or my skills my mom says to me in a high pitched drawl "Oh Gaby, how did you get so cultured?!?" leaving us in a fit of giggles.

So while that was not the best compliment I have ever received, it was the best-backhanded compliment that was I was to turn around and turn into a joke.

I have no clue where that girl is today, and frankly, I don't care. My life may have been turned upside down because of my time spent at FSU, and my life is nowhere where I intended it to be, but at least I don't have to deal with that type of fake people in my life. 

At least I know I am cultured.