iExamen 2

Nicholas Zwobot

EN*101

Dr. Ellis

30 October 2017

iExamen 2

            I thought at first this would be a very difficult task for me, just because of the type of person I am. I am not the warmest and first person to look at when it pertains to receiving compliments, but that does not mean I do not have a big heart. I am very sarcastic and just the way that I joke with my good friends I could see this task as daunting. I figured the only way to make this work was to pick the right day, and I have to channel the side of me that I normally channel when talking to my elders or people I have met for the first time.

            I began this challenge by deciding which day would work best for me. I knew that with my upcoming surgery, I was going to be home all weekend and away from my friends. At first, this might sound like a terrible thing to say, but in this particular case it is not. Because of how my friends and I talk to each other, where we take a more explicit tone with each other, this would be impossible around them. I decided that with surgery on Thursday, Friday would be the best day to put this to the test. When I began my day Friday, it went off without a hitch, because I was with my mom all day with her waiting on me constantly. It was easy as could be to have responses and conversations constantly pertaining to the three criteria. Even though every conversation that I had with my mom normally ended with her asking if I were sick, or her giving me an odd look, knowing this wasn’t the normal responses I would be giving her. All together this part of my day was very easy.

            My day suddenly became much more difficult and this was because of two major factors. One factor being, that my friends, being the good friends that they are, began to text and call me and ask how I was feeling post-surgery. I almost felt bad, because internally I was upset that my friends were all reaching out to me now, but I couldn’t be too upset. The first few exchanges were easy, because I was able to respond in a way that met the criteria, but didn’t give anything away. My biggest problem was when they began to tell me about what they had done the night before, or what they were planning on doing that upcoming weekend. It is safe to say my responses got stranger, and at one point with one certain friends, I went all out and called him “my beautiful flower.” As the day progressed I got better at responding to people, but I can now say that everyone tried to get out of the conversation as quickly as possible.

            After passing that barrier, the hardest obstacle to overcome was when my sister, who is a senior in high school, came home. Not that she and I have a bad relationship, but we have the relationship similar to the type of relationship I have with my friends. I would be lying if I said I tried my best to avoid her, but it is hard to do so when you can’t leave your bed. She eventually came to see me and after saying hi to me and her normal sisterly reactions, I tried my best to keep up with the three criteria. As I was running out of things to say, I decided to go into a tangent as to how she is a great sister, and I wish her nothing but the best in her future endeavors. This worked wonders, because the rest of our time together was spent in silence watching TV.

            This was definitely a little more difficult than our first iExamen, but the first iExamen helped me when partaking in the second one. The reason being is that once midnight hit on the day I was to begin, I deleted all social media. I did this in order to cut off some people that I know with whom I would not be able to keep it together. This may seem awful, but this was a precaution I felt like I needed in order to have complete success. Although I had a lot of weird reactions from this assignment, I never told anyone about the assignment. The reason I did not tell everyone I encountered why I was talking in such an odd manor, was because everything I had said would not have had meaning and even if at that time they saw it as weird, maybe what I said helped them. I feel that in certain situations, speaking like this is very reasonable, but at other times forcing yourself to talk like this to someone can ruin what you are trying to get across. With that in mind, this assignment has taught me that the way that I communicate is unique, but it is who I am, and changing would have more of a negative effect.