I was named after my grandfather’s favorite sister. An old viking name, made up of two parts that both individually mean battle, or war. In other words, I don’t arrive unnoticed. Apparently the likeness is striking. We don’t actually resemble each other, but we look at people the same way. My gaze preceded me, it was recognized in someone else first. Together with my battlecry of a name, I inherited a way of looking at people that apparently can be quite unsettling.
I like eye contact. I will look directly at you and wait to see if you look away or stay with me. It’s my deceptively quiet confrontation. I can talk to you for a whole evening and you’ll know nothing about me, but you’ll feel seen like never before. I read something just now that caught me a bit off guard, although it shouldn’t. The post-TikTok generation apparently doesn’t like eye contact, the now infamous Gen Z stare aside. The flat emotionless stare is supposed to signal that they’re in control, not performing. Ironically, I can’t think of anything more performative than sustained, unblinking, expressionless eye contact.
More tragic than the performance is the fact that looking into dead fish eyes produces no friction. There’s nothing to rub up against, only glazed over fear. If I win before we even begin, what’s the point? It’s also not actually eye contact if it’s performed to a camera, or to the person in front of you, that you’re not actually looking at. Neutral, unreadable, controlled. It’s the opposite of wanting something from the other person. The actual eye-to-eye meeting and accompanying small talk with a real person, has apparently become anxiety inducing.
I’m not immune to the fear of rejection, but I’m also addicted to the tension. I’ll try to get you to drop the pretense and say something real. The gaze held a beat longer than socially acceptable is where the magic lives. Something recognized and maybe even met, if just for a second. A door, suddenly ever so slightly ajar. An unlocked door I have no intention to walk through. I file it away like a pressed flower and move on.
My great aunt died young, I know almost nothing about her other than that my grandfather loved her and she died of heart failure at 35. Somehow the gaze survived her, traveled through him, and landed in me.