"Kevin don't listen to this." I
get this comment quite a bit and I've begun to ask myself "why?"
Regardless of who I am around there seems to be this perceived immaturity about
me. To be fair, I can act pretty goofy and do ridiculous things, however, it
seems to get exaggerated in certain contexts and some of my decisions are seen
as immature.
A
specific example comes to mind from about 2 months ago. I was with a group of
women and we were chit-chatting about movies, when someone mentioned a movie
called, “The Vow.” They were talking about it and one of them asked me if I had
seen it. I told them I had read the book but hadn't seen the movie. They asked
me “why not” and I told them that it didn't look like a movie I should watch.
They made some inquiries and I said that when I saw the preview the girl was
shown in her underwear twice and it just didn't seem like a movie I needed to
see. We began talking about this philosophy and told them that I generally
look-up PG-13 and R movies before I go see them. (The IMDB app has a really
good break down of different things you will see in the movie. It lists out
acts of violence, the type and frequency of profanity, and the different sexual/sensual
parts of the movie.) I don’t think any of the girls really processed that
because we just moved on and talked about other things until the very end of
the conversations when one of the ladies asked, “Do you really censor the
movies you watch?” I said, “Usually” and we went on our way.
I
don’t regret doing this and I still continue to do it. Honestly, the best check
I have for movies is asking, “would I want my son to see this?” If the answer
is “no,” then I probably shouldn't see it. That is primarily for sexually
focused movies, it works a little differently with movies with violence. For
example, with the movie “Lone Survivor,” (an absolutely fantastic movie) even
though I wouldn't let an eight year old watch it doesn't mean I won’t watch it
because there is a time when I would let him watch it. However with a movie
like, “The Hangover” or “Don Jon” there won’t be a time when I would want him
to see those movies.
I've gotten some different responses but they are all generally the same concept. “You're
over-sensitive,” or “you take things too far.” That part doesn't bother me, it’s
just what I do. My problem comes from how it manifests itself in other areas. I
feel like people think I don’t see those movies because I can’t handle them and
it leads to this assumption that I’m immature. And it sometimes gets
exaggerated to extreme points, I usually make some sort of joke and then ignore
it but it leaves me thinking, “you know I’m not a little kid.”
On
a similar but slightly different note. When I move to Oklahoma City I’m going
to be done with being the class clown. (I mean I’ll still be funny and adorable,
just not as goofy.) I’m just kind of ready for a change.
