i know what it is. treating me like i'm an idiot as a way of making me believe i'm not "as smart." usually it happens when people are actually threatened. i'm irritated for a few reasons, but one of them is two conversations with the same person.

1. she asked me to keep the scoreboard score and i didn't know how because i've never used the master box, and i don't think she did either. i suspected that's why she asked me to do it. the score was home 6, visitors 7. our team scores another basket. she says, "just add two points." so i asked her, "are we home or visitors?" she says, "does it matter?" like i'm asking a really ridiculous question. and for a second i was confused because...it does matter. that information tells me which side to add the 2 points to, and which side to add subsequent points to. i had no idea where she was coming from.

2. we called a 3 down 2 up defense. that means 1-guard and 2-guard play up, the 3 and 4 and 5 play low. same girl usually plays low as the 3 and I play the 2. so when we called the defense she went to the 2-guard position, which is usually mine. i asked if she was going to play the 2 or 3 (shooting guard or small forward because it determines where your physical position is in the defense). and AGAIN, she says, "does it matter?" and it confused the hell out of me because which position you're playing determines where you are in the defense, your actual physical location and role on the defensive (and offensive) end.

i think she's fucking with me.

the other night, i had this guy try to tell me that i looked familiar, and i knew he was just spitting (idiotic) game. so i just looked at him like i wasn't having it. then he tries to convince me that he knows me because "we dated last year." like he actually thought he could plant enough doubt in my head that i might believe him.

it's a power game. to see if you can get into someone's head by planting something untrue. because if you can, this person is not sure of themselves and can be manipulated. it's unethical and shows your own weakness if you're resorting to it.

see, my mom is a good person to bounce this off of for clarity, to ask her for objective eyes because she's the queen of interpersonal strategy. she makes sure she's clear of any potential motive in a given situation. and i have trouble with clarity when it comes with the subtlety of power struggles with women. but my mom is the root of my issues with power struggles with women, in that when i was young, she established a baseline of normalcy that allowed for her to manipulate me if she needed, so while my instincts pick up on it and something ambiguous will bother me on an instinctive level, i have trouble seeing it/unraveling it as i would something with which i have more distance. my goal is to lead if i'm suited, allow others to lead if they are better suited, but never to dominate for the sake of dominating. i'm actually a good team player as i tend to put anything greater that i'm a part of first and i take care of my teammates, especially ones younger or weaker than me, but i also compete with myself to be the best i can be. but i seem to have trouble with women on my own team trying to dominate me or sabotage me.

i know i bring it up a lot, but it's to remind me of an area of my blindness. when i was the captain of my high school basketball team, i took that seriously. loyalty and protectiveness are core facets of my personality. one of the girls on my team got in a fight with a girl on another team after a game, and i went to break it up and took a hard backhand for her. and i didn't care because it's part of standing by someone who's on your team. but then a few months later, she knew that all i cared about was playing for the varsity softball team and while i had a good chance of making it, she probably wouldn't...so she told everyone on the varsity team that during the basketball season, i'd been bragging about how i was the best player to ever come out of the school. yes, the problem was that i was very good and knew it. but she did blow it out of proportion and her goal was to cause a negative reaction towards me, and sure enough, i was physically confronted by the team, then banned from the team by the coach because, as he told my dad, "she doesn't seem to get along with the other girls." in hindsight, i see that girl clearly--her jealousy, her malevolence...she hated the way she felt about herself around me so she tried to make me believe a version of myself and reality that wasn't true. and up until then, i never thought anything negative of her, and in fact, had been loyal to her because she was my teammate. i got hit from my blindside.

these days, i can't always tell what it is exactly, but i get a feeling when something's not right, when a reality someone's presenting doesn't jive. a lot of times, i defer, like i've been deferring to this "does it matter?' girl. and then i realize, i'm losing my own ground. i'm allowing someone to shake my foundation, making me question myself.

yes, it does matter which team is guest or visitor when you're running a scoreboard that's already in play. yes, it matters what position you're playing when you're running an organized defense. i'm not an unintelligent person. but for someone to try to make me feel that way, especially when we're supposed to be on the same side...makes me very suspicious of their character.