DIRT: the grunge diaries (𝒱𝒾𝒸𝓉𝑜𝓇𝒾𝒶'𝓈 𝓋𝑒𝓇𝓈𝒾𝑜𝓃)

entry #115- 19 and life

⚠️ lame af jokes. plenty of them ⚠️

'Cool, brother. Your ID now, smokin' hot'. The bouncer guy speaks, opening the entrance rope of the club for Sean, after taking a very hurried, very superficial look at his ID and at his VIP pass. Now he's checking me out big time, and his 'smokin hot' addressed my way doesn't fail to make me want to bend down and throw up on the concrete floor. All puke out in a single shot. First, I just ain't into vulgar 'compliments' about my appearance, I find them utterly nauseous and superficial. I don't look good, by any means, I look exotic and that's what gets the manly attention for me... but I'm much more than just my looks, and I hate it when people get stuck at face value. Second, I'm here with a man, a man who's my boyfriend and who's literally holding my hand, and I regard checking me out and calling me names in front of him as the biggest form of disrespect towards him there is. Surprisingly enough, Sean doesn't throw his stolen wine glass at the guy and bust his forehead open like I thought he would've... he just gives him a sarcastic side eye, and my hip a firm squeeze, because he's feeling like it, and I can't take it away from him. Actually, I would never want to take this chill away from him. On the contrary, I aspire to keep him this level of tame whenever a fucker thinks he can flatter me by calling me disgusting nicknames in front of him.

He gives my hip a second, more playful and less firm squeeze, probably as a reminder that I still haven't handed my ID over to the bouncer, like I was asked to... and probably also as a silent, sarcastic remark on how my ID ain't gonna allow me into this club, unless he decides to intervene. Knowing that I'll be kept at the door like a captive, without my boyfriend's charitable intervention, I hand my ID over to the bouncer. My ID, being a shitty, Jordanian travel document that gets me kicked out of places more than it gets me let in. It's gonna get me banned from this place too... but for once it'll be for my age, and not for my 'nationality '. I am 'Jordanian' for the world to know, and that alone is enough to always warrant me a few weird looks and stupid questions. I am nineteen, born on the same soil as Jesus Christ, only 1972 years and eight months after the bad boy, and my age doesn't warrant me access to this place by default. Nineteen, a terrorist, wearing a keffiyeh in my refugee passport picture... I know I'm gonna make myself look like an idiot by just trying to get into this club. But still, I'll try. And if I won't succeed, at least I'll be able to say I pulled a real nice comedy skit. Because that's exactly my intention here. Who says that the pre party can't be just as fun as the actual party?

'You open it from right to left, brother! It's flipped! I'm Arab!' I instruct the bouncer, who is a silly, regular white man who believes that my passport is one of the western kind, and he's stupidly trying to open it from left to right. But no, it doesn't work left to right, at my latitudes! We write from right to left and our books are right to left oriented too. Including mini books like ... passports! I mean, if the yank bouncer doesn't flip my passport and sees it was issued by The (mighty and charitable) Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, it'll be cool with me. If he doesn't open it and sees that I'm nineteen, it's even better. But if he has to open, he has to open the right way, or we'll spend the next half an hour queuing up in this very same spot, no progress whatsoever. I'm trying to cock a confident 'I have no secrets and no reasons to believe you wouldn't let me into the club' attitude, motioning the bouncer to flip my passport with a bunch of dramatic hand gestures, and all the Arab sassiness that makes me ... me. My boyfriend is laughing, tugging me by the arm, and I think that we're both very impatient to get in, at this point. The only thing getting in the way of us and the club ... is my age. But we can always get to our end goal with a good amount of clownery and comedy. I am ready to swear upon that. Cherry & Sean clowning together are always bound to be a solid winning team.