The food is nice, too

It may be that I've never been as introverted as I thought I was. What I may have been was anxious.

I go to my family reunion without Amber as a buffer -- she had to work this weekend in penance of taking off the weekend of our anniversary party -- and am energized for the rest of the day. (We could write this off as having glutted myself with an abundance of food, but I do not feel calorically comatose.) There's something about being people to whom I feel a genetic but infrequently social connection. I do not recall the last time I socialized with a family member outside of an occasion, if this had indeed ever occurred. Somehow, this invigorates me as nothing has in months.

I smiled at people for the rest of the day, while buying groceries and walking around town. I felt witty and on point. I am my better self.

Most of my days, I'm not around people. I have my students, yes, but it's hardly the same thing. We don't socialize. There is no love to it. I need this sort of energy, and I don't have it.

I've always found myself around the introverts. I don't regret this. Many of my introverts -- Daniel and Amber, primarily -- are my favorite people in the world. They just get energy in a different way. I want to go out go dancing. I want to have massive meals with people. But that isn't done anymore, at least not among my social circle. I don't know how to alter that. Where do the extroverts congregate and how do I get an invitation?

If I had more money, or my own home, I would do this sort of thing often. I do not get enough backyard BBQs or living room shows. They may be an artifact of another time and place. We are insulated as a culture now, at least in America. We don't really see one another. We don't socialize in a large-scale way. Even when we are in public, we are closed off, we are on our devices. I saw that with my niblings at this party. Aside from Adalyn, the youngest, the rest were on Nintendo Switches or their cell phones. This is not meant being curmudgeonly, just that they were there, but not present.

Maybe that's understandable. What relevance do these old people have to them? But my niblings missed out. They could be as faux introverted as I thought I was. They could not care beyond the food, though they do not bless the occasion.

I wonder aloud to my brothers if I was like this when I was younger. I always had a book with me and would fall into it when I became bored or anxious. I knew better than to take it out when there were other things going on. I didn't try to hide away if I could manage it. I was a nervous child and people scared me, but I wouldn't have retreated. Once there was someone to give me some attention -- especially if there was a chance of making conversation with someone near my age -- I would have attempted extroversion. I would have found some way in which I could socialize, and I never would have thought to focus on my Game Boy.

Is what I want so impossible? Other countries have an easier time with this, even countries with rampant handheld technology. My own little town of Red Hook has festivals all the time, but they aren't about socializing. We are all together alone during a spectacle, a parade or a concert in the parking lot. It isn't the same thing. Socializing requires interconnection. We barely speak unless to decline the Jehovah's Witnesses or political candidates.

Family

When my cousin Allison asks where my little wife is, she says how much she loves her. I didn't know she felt that way and try to remember what interactions they have had. (I can account for none outside these parties.) Allison adds as an afterthought said that she also loves me and that I'm handsome, so I can forgive being second place to Amber. It warms me to hear someone say I am handsome. However small a role I have in the lives of most of my extended family, it's pleasant to know that I am still held in positive regard. She does not seem to heap the same praise on my brothers, though I admit to not listening for it.

The next day, I feel hungover. I had been social and loved, even if I talked to fewer than ten people, even if I didn't visit a solitary word upon my cousins who were only a table away.

My times at Free Spirit Gathering affected me so deeply because I came to feel comfortable around a tribe -- after a certain adjustment to several of them being completely naked. I would love if I could live in a development with my friends having a common courtyard where we could spend time together as we wished.

I don't want to hang out with my current neighbors. I would not want to feel that I lacked privacy. I would like to be able to go somewhere and have people want to talk to me or feel a sense of community. I want a place where I could feel warmly alone together as we worked on our respective arts.

Soon in Xenology: Writing.

last watched: Schitt's Creek
reading: Trying Not to Try