Body Language
One of these years, I really need to not have a schedule conflict during the Flirting For Geeks panel. J is a student of body language and has been educating me about some of the finer points.
Most people have a twenty-year head start on me for body-linguistics related to flirtation, but I am not illiterate about body language more generally. I speak a robust and practical creole based on the range of experience that you have when you grow up in a culture that doesn't allow expressions of sexual interest. The phrases I can send and receive include "I am paying attention", "I am bored," "stop what you're doing," "give more of what you're doing," "you're standing too close", "I made this the way it is because I want it to be that way, so don't change it back," and many other trivial deductions. No problem.
What eludes me is the temporal shift of expressing intentions about the future-- about activities that are not happening right now. Interest in what I am currently doing is not the same thing as interest in what we might do somewhere more private. The only way I can interpret body language in relation to fooling around is if I am fooling around with you at that time.
If you touch me, you just started that activity, which means I can react to it. So that works very well. I was touched repeatedly this weekend. For instance, if you put your hand on me, I interpret that message as "I am comfortable with hand contact between us." Easy, direct, kind of difficult not to notice. That method is For The Win.
The tricky bit, for me, is reacting to body language with body language. I am training myself to react to body language, not just by adjusting the behavior that it is a reaction to, but by sending back my own body language just like a two-way conversation.
Have you heard of couch-scooting? When I got together with J, she told me that for years she had assumed I was uninterested in her because of couch-scooting. All those years ago, she would scoot closer to me on the couch to communicate that she was attracted to me. I did not speak that language, so I didn't scoot closer, or notice that she had done so. I usually only interpret when someone increases their personal space.
Ever since then, I planned for this weekend at Penguicon that I would make myself deliberately aware of the body language tricks I have been taught to look for. I scooted on a couch, and sustained eye contact with eyes that were very much worth sustaining contact with, and watched for reciprocation. I still place no stock in the quality of my interpretations-- even when attention is fixed directly on me, it has to do with what I am doing at the time. I would be foolhardy to think otherwise. But only the accumulation of observations will improve my guesses.
One regret that I have from this weekend is that when anyone's badge flipped over so that it could not be read, or the lighting was bad, I should have thought to come right out and ask what letters were on the Interest Ribbon. That could have been a good ice breaker. I was so exhausted and distracted from running the convention, I was not up to my usual level of conversation. On balance, I do feel that I made some good headway this weekend.
Going back to the point about touching me: One woman, a complete stranger, actually walked right up to me and kissed me on the lips. This was when I was in the middle of running Opening Ceremonies. I encourage the direct approach; it helps me out tremendously. All this dancing around that we do with nonverbal communication to preserve each other's feelings and our own is very necessary and good, but stretches the process out over years. Don't you wish you could just condense it sometimes?
So of course I followed up. Unfortunately the woman was wearing a mask at the time which covered the actual mouth. And was a species other than mine. And also turned out later to only be disguised as my sexual preference. So, there was nowhere for that to go. I still award major points on principle.
Comments
rmeidaking on May. 6, 2009 12:37 AM
Only disguised as a human? ;-) (Yeah, I know what it means to be painfully heterosexual, too.)
le-bebna-kamni on May. 6, 2009 10:02 PM
Ah, but you miss one other aspect of the couch-scooting principle: doing the opposite also sends the opposite message, disinterest.
For example, if a woman has scooted closer to you during the course of your conversation, and you get up for a drink or a bathroom break, and then when you come back you sit farther away -- and consistently, I might add -- it's usually a signal that you're not interested. Perhaps it was your subconscious childhood conditioning against contact with The Other Sex or a desire not to scare me away by being too forward. ;)
matt-arnold on May. 7, 2009 12:01 AM
They receive the opposite message. It is not "sent". If I move a cup, it follows logically that I moved it because I either didn't want it where it was, or I want it where I moved it. If you move it back, and I move it to third place, it follows I just didn't want it where it was. By contrast, with couch-scooting, nothing follows-- there is no connection between the behavior and the conclusion.
gothicsquish on May. 8, 2009 3:32 PM
i loooved the badges... im good at body interpertation, but like to know if they are comfortable with my lifestyle... so it made things sooo smooth.
matt-arnold on May. 8, 2009 3:33 PM
Really? What did your interest ribbon say? I might have missed an opportunity. :)
Mine said FSCKR L P
gothicsquish on May. 8, 2009 4:19 PM
FSCKR G P =] im saving my for future cons.
le-bebna-kamni on May. 13, 2009 11:51 AM
Yes, the badges were awesome. I hope they find their way into Penguicon next year...and maybe other cons in the area?
gothicsquish on May. 13, 2009 2:34 PM
I sooo want to introduce them to /all/ cons!
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