I was taken to a park. There was a slide. Unlike any other time I'd been to a park, there were a bunch of other children, lined up, sliding down, running around to slide down again. I was baffled by this, and patiently waited for them to finish playing so I could have the slide to myself as usual. My mother thought I was shy, and urged me to get in line and play. I tried, I did it, but found it an utterly unpleasant experience. I preferred not to "play" in a crush of strange, pushy and smelly children. Not shy, just not that social.
A similar experience with an Easter Egg hunt. Lined up, I could see several eggs, and figured I'd just go pick them up, never really considering the mass of other children who could see them as well as I could. I hesitated, waiting for them all to run off while I went and picked up a couple. I was aghast at them taking my eggs, leaving me empty handed and foolish. My poor brother who took me to the event, I'm sure he had no idea how to explain. He got me an egg somehow, plastic, empty.
I have liked crowds at times. Christmas Eve morning at Eastern Market is a joyful rush of teeming crowd, cold and friendly with tea, cheese, and chocolate as a reward. I rather like shopping at Haymarket on a Saturday morning. I don't mind when the train is so crowded there is no room to move, as long as my feet don't hurt too badly. I work in a team in a small crowded room all day. I love my work.
But I have this issue with people getting in my way.
In Utah, there is a socially acceptable (well, not to me) habit of people holding conversations in the only passage through an area. In the middle of doorways or crowded hallways, store entrances or grocery aisles. At the airport, I once had to force my way past two well dressed women chatting at the bottom of an escalator. I probably didn't need to have whacked one with my backpack quite so vigorously. Not need, as such.
I missed my train home today because of several people blocking pathways unnecessarily. And another woman on the train "saved" the window seat, others having to stand. A group of three further blocked her empty seat. I was seething about this, until I saw the guy hit her absently with his backpack as he gestured to his two friends. I had to grin, draining my irritation.
I often sit alone at lunch, as a way of resting my brain, and gathering myself together. When I was in Basic, I ate very fast, always the first to finish, even if I was the last in line, because sometimes it meant I would have five minutes alone. I could walk back to the barracks and sit and be by myself. Much as I love friends, much as I love my work, I need the balance of time alone. Having a place to myself. I don't mind waiting until everyone else has taken their turn.
3 comments:
I could never meet my needs and put my self in perspective until I lived alone. My needs must be complicated and vast countryside. I am very busy keeping track of internal assaults, disruptions. If I don't pay close attention to that tear it might well become a rent and I might well end in being in peices. If I can't have quiet for the pieces to knit back in place I cohere in a limping monstrous patchwork (I spent years with an eye between my legs and an elbow above my lips).
I may not like my tender shape, but quiet and way space give the foggy bank an identifiable outline. The land of Me. Within the land of me is not an easy go. The rocks are sharp, water holes dry up, volcanoes blast. There is no way to leave the land of me but to go to sea, so I often work on boat building.
But the borders of Me are my front and my back and escape is death.
I am in a crush of souls desperately seeking their escapes. Like children waiting at the slide.
I understand this completely, since I'm much the same way. I like the anonymity of crowds in markets, streets, the subway; I like watching the great variety of people and usually feel pretty affectionate toward them. I'm quite capable of being sociable in situations where I feel comfortable or have a clear job to do. I both enjoy solitude and am aware of myself existing in time and space in relationship to others. Like you, I get very irritated at people who seem to have none of that awareness - something I find vastly more prevalent in the U.S. than in Canada.
Oh, Bill, you outshine me again, thank you.
Beth,
Yes, well there is a bit more Space to move around in Canada. It may also attract more folks with this need because of that room.
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