Merriam-Webster Online defines "misanthrope" as "a person who hates or distrusts mankind". This is in some small way reassuring, since I now know that I am not a misanthrope. What I am, however, is somewhat antisocial. Very few people would know this about me. At work, I am certainly friendly enough, although I take great care not to actually know people in any way that isn't superficial. I think my co-workers would speak very positively about me, saying that I am helpful, sharing, giving, friendly. All of which is true. They just don't know anything about me that matters.
In the same sense, I am very careful in my use of the word "friend". Not counting those few who have endured through irregular encounters since childhood, I have three friends. There is no distinction between work friends, drinking friends, friends through our kids, lunch friends or any of those arbitrary categories that people use. I have three groups of people that I know - family, friends and acquaintances. My family is easy to sort out (and my wife and daughters fall into that special crossbred category of family who are also really my best friends). My friends are Jonathan, Keith and Harry. These are the guys, each of them very different, who I actually talk about things that matter to me, whose judgment I don't fear, who I know I can be honest with and who know they can be honest with me. Do I tell them everything? Of course not; we aren't women. But I don't think there is anything I couldn't tell them, and that's what counts. Everyone else is just an acquaintance.
I was reminded of this basic antisocial nature while sitting at dance class yesterday waiting for Brittany to finish up. While the other parents gabbed about nothing that really matters to them or anyone else, I listened to Fiona Apple on my headphones while reading Kevin Canty's novel "Into the Great Wide Open" (which I highly recommend to this point in my reading). I could have talked to them. They're always very nice to me, and I'm very nice to them when I choose to speak. And these are actually pretty good and interesting people, people whose company I would enjoy if I was a different kind of person. But I much preferred the company of my thoughts, Canty's words and Fiona's voice. I'm not sure what they think of me, and I don't care.
But today we had a visit from my Uncle Sheldon, and I was reminded yet again that I just need the right crowd. Ask Jonathan, Keith or Harry and I'm certain each of them would say I have no problems socially (other than, perhaps, occasional inappropriateness). Ask my wife, and she could tell you about situations where I froze and simply did not speak to anyone at a gathering, most recently this past August. We were at a family function, and I simply could not will myself to sit up in my chair to lean forward and speak to her grandmother. Even while I was failing to do this, I was trying to overcome my resistance, knowing it was just wrong. It certainly doesn't seem like a complicated thing to do, but at the moment it was beyond my capabilities. My desire to not speak with this utterly harmless and pleasant woman was so great that I could not overcome it, earning at least briefly my wife's enmity for my failure. This breakdown forced me to be honest with her about this difficulty which has long dogged me at unfortunate moments.
But in the right group, with people I am comfortable with, I can't be shut up. Today was one of those days, with my girls, two of my three brothers and Sheldon. Sheldon was my favorite uncle growing up, visiting Cape Breton every year or so from Toronto. He knew about movies and music and TV shows and all the celebrity gossip before there was "Entertainment Tonight" and "Premiere" magazine. He was involved on the periphery of show business, as an actor in bit parts and as the road manager for a period for female impersonator Craig Russell (who I once spoke to on an early morning long-distance telephone call). He remains, all these years later, my most interesting relative, still youthful and dynamic at 60, still devoted to Barbra Streisand and Elizabeth Taylor. Growing up, he was a concrete reminder that I didn't have to be crushed by my environment, that I could escape the limitations of my birthplace, what I referred to often as the place where trends go to die. It is always a pleasure to see him, and I always want my girls to appreciate this marvelous man, who will likely spend less time in their lives than he did in mine.
In the same sense, I am very careful in my use of the word "friend". Not counting those few who have endured through irregular encounters since childhood, I have three friends. There is no distinction between work friends, drinking friends, friends through our kids, lunch friends or any of those arbitrary categories that people use. I have three groups of people that I know - family, friends and acquaintances. My family is easy to sort out (and my wife and daughters fall into that special crossbred category of family who are also really my best friends). My friends are Jonathan, Keith and Harry. These are the guys, each of them very different, who I actually talk about things that matter to me, whose judgment I don't fear, who I know I can be honest with and who know they can be honest with me. Do I tell them everything? Of course not; we aren't women. But I don't think there is anything I couldn't tell them, and that's what counts. Everyone else is just an acquaintance.
I was reminded of this basic antisocial nature while sitting at dance class yesterday waiting for Brittany to finish up. While the other parents gabbed about nothing that really matters to them or anyone else, I listened to Fiona Apple on my headphones while reading Kevin Canty's novel "Into the Great Wide Open" (which I highly recommend to this point in my reading). I could have talked to them. They're always very nice to me, and I'm very nice to them when I choose to speak. And these are actually pretty good and interesting people, people whose company I would enjoy if I was a different kind of person. But I much preferred the company of my thoughts, Canty's words and Fiona's voice. I'm not sure what they think of me, and I don't care.
But today we had a visit from my Uncle Sheldon, and I was reminded yet again that I just need the right crowd. Ask Jonathan, Keith or Harry and I'm certain each of them would say I have no problems socially (other than, perhaps, occasional inappropriateness). Ask my wife, and she could tell you about situations where I froze and simply did not speak to anyone at a gathering, most recently this past August. We were at a family function, and I simply could not will myself to sit up in my chair to lean forward and speak to her grandmother. Even while I was failing to do this, I was trying to overcome my resistance, knowing it was just wrong. It certainly doesn't seem like a complicated thing to do, but at the moment it was beyond my capabilities. My desire to not speak with this utterly harmless and pleasant woman was so great that I could not overcome it, earning at least briefly my wife's enmity for my failure. This breakdown forced me to be honest with her about this difficulty which has long dogged me at unfortunate moments.
But in the right group, with people I am comfortable with, I can't be shut up. Today was one of those days, with my girls, two of my three brothers and Sheldon. Sheldon was my favorite uncle growing up, visiting Cape Breton every year or so from Toronto. He knew about movies and music and TV shows and all the celebrity gossip before there was "Entertainment Tonight" and "Premiere" magazine. He was involved on the periphery of show business, as an actor in bit parts and as the road manager for a period for female impersonator Craig Russell (who I once spoke to on an early morning long-distance telephone call). He remains, all these years later, my most interesting relative, still youthful and dynamic at 60, still devoted to Barbra Streisand and Elizabeth Taylor. Growing up, he was a concrete reminder that I didn't have to be crushed by my environment, that I could escape the limitations of my birthplace, what I referred to often as the place where trends go to die. It is always a pleasure to see him, and I always want my girls to appreciate this marvelous man, who will likely spend less time in their lives than he did in mine.
posted by George @ 9:00 p.m.
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