I’m the kind of person who has a hard time saying no, which means my life is a nightmare each time there’s a club fair.

I’ll admit that I have a wide variety of interests, sure, but there are just some things I don’t have a passion for. I know that I’ll never have the right drive to make me successful in the fashion clubs, nor the faintest inclination toward various auto clubs or pre-dental societies.

But that doesn’t mean I haven’t signed up for them.

Though I try to spread my listserv-joining signatures across three different email accounts, I still can’t escape the day when I inevitably check my inbox only to find several digital reminders of my spinelessness waiting for me. Whether it’s because I have a delightful conversation with a person at a table or a club possesses more aggressive means of marketing to students, I’m prone to pick up that pen even if I have no intention of visiting a meeting.

I’ve gotten better at saying no. I don’t know whether to call it senioritis or just a growing callousness, but no club will ever be as distinct in my mind for persuading me to sign up for their listserv despite an almost complete absence of interest as the Metal Club.

I’ve always been a fan of rock music, and I’m sure I listen to a fair amount of light metal, but besides the occasion playing of Rob Zombie’s “Dragula” every Halloween, I don’t listen to metal of my own volition very often. I’m not sure I even give off the impression to passersby of being a metalhead (which I chalk up to wearing glasses and pastel colors).

That might be stereotyping — metal listeners aren’t all ’90s high school movie stereotypes — but I know for a fact that when I attended the First Look Fair during my first semester at this university, I was not indicating to anyone that I had even heard of, oh, let’s say Rammstein. 

Still, despite that, I was surprised to find myself singled out from the throngs on McKeldin Mall by the Metal Club’s eager members.

“Hey, you seem cool! You should join the metal club!,” a member shouted.

Despite the overwhelming urge I felt to pretend I hadn’t heard them, I was pretty surprised. No other club had called me out like that, much less a club that seemed so removed from my interests.

I walked over to the table. “Do I look like I listen to metal?” I asked out of genuine curiosity. 

I’m pretty sure the members responded with, “Well, you look like an awesome person, so you should!”

You just have to admire the salesmanship. The Metal Club members turned every negative I said into a positive. I could have said I only listened to classical and they no doubt would’ve found a loophole through which to rope me in.

We exchanged a few pleasantries, and despite my instincts to say no and absolute lack of metal knowledge, I wrote down my name and main email address anyway. Clubs forever.