The Scale Of Like

It's now afternoon and I'm still sat - unshowered - in my dressing gown with the curtains closed, having had my standard Saturday morning YouTube catch-up. As I am about to embark on arguably the most important three weeks of my life so far - examinations, the results of which will decide where I live, who my friends are and essentially which direction my life goes in - I figured that writing a silly blog post instead of revising was the way forward. If I fail my A-Levels, it's the internet's fault.

So I've been doing a lot of reading recently, and I was trying to come up with a system of rating books. Because on my film-blog I use the standard five-star rating thing, but it frustrates me when I have to lump two films in the same rating even though I found one significantly better than the other. I considered broadening into the ten-star spectrum, but then giving six stars sounds mean, when it actually means the film was better than average.

And the other day I was talking to a friend and was trying to explain to him that I measure people according to a Scale of Like, that goes something like this: -
People I love and actively try to spend lots of time with.
People I like and enjoy spending time with.
People I like but don't go out of my way to see.
People I don't really like but enjoy the company of.
People I'm indifferent to.
People I don't like and would rather not see/meet.
People I really don't like and actively avoid.
It occurred to me that what this basically means is that there are two measurements of a person; how much you like them, and how much you enjoy their company. These are not the same things. You can consider somebody a really decent, kind and generous person but find some habit of theirs irreconcilably irritating (like those religious people who live exceptionally generous lives, but constantly try to shove their views down your throat); so you like them, but you don't actually want to spend all that much time with them. And there are those people who you know aren't actually very nice, but they're funny or charismatic or just exciting to be with, so you enjoy seeing them regardless (like that person in every group who everyone's actually slightly frightened of, but they're so much fun you have to keep them around).

But I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing to place people on the Scale Of Like. I don't think it makes a judgemental person, because if it did then the world would be full of judgemental people, because a personality is completely subjective. What one person finds annoying another person can find endearing. What one person finds weird, another finds funny. What one person finds romantic, another finds sickening. That's just life; everyone has their own Scale Of Like, and every person is different on every Scale.

I think I lost my point somewhere along this blog, because reading it back it looks like I'm saying "It's okay to judge people," which isn't my point at all. My point is that it's fine to not like people sometimes, because whatever it is that you don't like about them, someone else will love. And besides, not-liking someone isn't as simple as just not liking them. Or something.

(I was going to end it there, but then the ridiculousness of my current situation hit me and I thought I'd paint you a picture. A 17-year-old girl with last night's make-up smudged across her face, greasy-haired and wearing a dressing gown with her curtains closed at 12.30pm, writing a philosophical blog post only her friend's will read with a slightly iffy message, instead of revising for the exams that dictate the rest of her life. Ah, the youth of today.)