By Meher Ahmad
<[email protected]>

After years of selling Girl Scout cookies and a few months of waitressing, I’ve perfected, in my opinion, the art of faking it.

Most jobs require faking it, since most jobs are 90% mundane. Jobs in service are especially heavy on the fake, since there is no way every hostess, waitress and bartender could be genuinely friendly to every rude and inconsiderate customer.

However, I’ve found I’ve carried over this habit of faking it into my daily life, outside of work and selling Girl Scout cookies. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, since most activities in life couldn’t occur without some sense of fake-ness. In some situations, faking a good attitude can save everyone involved from an unpleasant experience. Students have to be genial towards adults who are sometimes, frankly, irritating and neurotic. Teenagers have to force conversation with their parents to get some extra cash for a night out, or an extended curfew.

For a good number of people, though, that element of fake translates into acting fake in front of the majority of people, including friends. I’ve caught myself laughing at jokes I don’t think are funny in front of people just to make it less awkward, forcing smiles in situations that would deem it appropriate.

In order to keep a steady income from waitressing, I push aside a bad mood or an emotional day to greet people with a smile. I do the same at school, to avoid embarrassing situations and to try and attempt to focus on classroom activities. But there has to be some release in life for true emotions.

Perhaps it is because, due to recent events, I’ve become more cynical towards the good in life. If I didn’t fake a smile, I’d probably be scowling or sneering at someone else. If I didn’t forcibly laugh at immature jokes, I’d be perpetually stone-faced.

One notion I’ve heard repeatedly in these last months of school is the thought that all this fake behavior will end when seniors go to college. I have to admit I’ve fallen victim to this thought process as well. I’ve entertained the idea that in college, I’d meet the perfect group of friends that would never cease to entertain me, and I’d never have to fake even an idea of a smile in front of them.

Once I thought about it, though, I came to realize that, on the contrary, being fake is almost mandatory in college. Meeting new people is virtually impossible unless one feigns interest in someone’s class, major, hometown, etc. When I moved schools sophomore year, it was a solid month of fake. Once I moved past the frivolities of meeting new people, however, the level of fake-ness slowly leveled off.

I often think about how tiring it is to constantly act in front of others, and whether it’s obvious or not. I recognize when others are faking it many times, and it’s a little embarrassing when noticeably evident. If I was to be, for lack of an un-cliché phrase, ‘the real me’ all the time, I have a feeling I’d turn into the cynical girl everyone hates.

I’ve instead resolved to reach a happy medium. While I recognize I need to stop forcing a certain personality to please others, I also know acting how I feel all of the time would result in utter disaster and possible alienation from the rest of society. Meher Ahmad is a reporter for the HiLite. Contact her at [email protected].