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So I was out with a friend this morning and we got talking about a mutual acquaintance. I referred to the last time the three of us were together and made a throwaway comment like, "I thought it was funny when we [the guy and I] started talking about a particular author's back catalogue and you were confused as to what we were going on about."
Now I didn't say this in a mocking tone, or at all in a cruel way. I was merely referring to the frown on her face while me and this man were talking about a particular author. My friend had heard of the writer but isn't a fan.
Anyway, she told me I had to realise not everyone was into the same things I was and I said, "I know...I was just commenting that it felt as if me and him were...not ganging up, but forming our own little bookworm club and you didn't know what we were on about." Just...acknowledging that we'd been away in our own little world talking about a writer of whom we're both fans, so she knew I wasn't completely oblivious to her presence there.
She went on to say, "After all, there are things I know about that you don't, and vice versa."
I started to defend myself and tell her, "I know we all have different interests; I was just acknowledging the fact-" intending to add, "-we may have excluded you."
Well by this time she was in her stride. "After all, how often do you go out?"
"Huh?"
She asked again.
"Well...every day."
"No you don't."
"Pardon me? Yes I do!"
"As often as me? I don't think so."
I asked her, how does she know how often I go out, then she asked do I go out a lot, or do I read a lot. I said both. She said "You don't read when you go out. You can't have it both ways."
"Yes I can. I go out of the house. And I read."
"Well then you're not meeting people are you? If you just want to spend your time reading you may as well stay indoors. There's no point going out if you're going to spend all your time reading."
"Uh...change of scenery?"
"But you're not talking to people if you go out and sit alone, reading."
"Maybe I don't want to!"
"Then why go out?"
*sigh*
Upshot is, she prefers to go out and meet people whereas I never go out (how she knows this I don't know) and when I do, I take a book with me and never talk to people, so there's no point in me leaving the house. This is the same person who told me months ago if no-one ever reads what you write, you're not a writer. Basically, you're not a writer 'til you're published. I have a lot of respect for her; she has oodles of integrity but...damn. Some people just don't get it.
I'm not a people person but if I never meet people and never talk to them, how did I manage to get into a debate with a mutual acquaintance about a particular author in front of her? I was about to apologise for excluding her from the conversation but she thought my apology was what excluded her, as in - emphasising that me and our male friend were readers, and she is not.
She's not a reader, see, because she's always out of the house, here, there, everywhere, spending time with her family, doing things, working and so on...and she insists, downright insists, that she goes out more than I do. And I never meet new people because I've always got my nose in a book.
The thing is, I do meet new people. I meet people all the time. I just don't see why I should waste my breath on them if we're not on the same level. Take tt42 for instance. Now, we've never met but we will someday for sure (beware of that day, folks. Beware). I also know for sure that if I said to her, face to face, "Christ, I need some me-time, I'm off to my room," or "I'm going out, I want to write a few thousand words," she wouldn't take offence or see that as a snub. She'd probably think, "Oh thank God. Thought she'd never piss off."
See...it's not a matter of writers being anti-social. It's not even a writer thing, I think. It's a matter of knowing what you like in other people, what you're willing to put up with, what you're not...and finding people who agree with you on that.
I believe too many people form friendships because of proximity. "You live near me so let's hang out." Fuck that. I'd rather have no local friends than pootle around town with folks I have little more in common with than the city we inhabit. Friendship by default? No thanks. I'd rather spend time with folks I like.
I guess I'm just thinking out loud, rejigging a few ideas I have about my social life and how I spend my time. I sincerely believe that writers are misunderstood - we're seen as anti-social, as I've said, even though we're people-watchers. We have to be. So we're on the outside looking in much of the time.
Added to which my attitude to people regardless of my occupation is, "If I don't like you, fuck off." Life's too short to socialise for the sake of it. I don't see why I should flit here there and everywhere just so people won't call me anti-social, say I have no life or accuse me of 'never going out'.
I do go out, but when I do it's not to be visible. It's to go out with a purpose - pay bills, meet someone (yes, really!), have lunch, change of scenery, write, read, go for a walk. Sometimes on my own, sometimes with a friend. But people I count as true friends don't need to be in my face all the time, talking at me, being in my business. I prefer companions whose company I can keep with no pressure to be 'on'. People who are as accepting of me as I am of them. I'm a writer, not an actress. If you want someone to perform, go to the theatre. This is my life, not a stage set to entertain you.
I'm sick of being expected to work the room when I just don't want to. Hell, if I was that awful a person I'd not have any friends at all. I'd never have chatted with aforementioned acquaintance about Jane Austen, the Brontes, Dickens, Plato and the like. I'd never have talked to the hunky librarian about Anais Nin and The Torture Garden.
So please, more visibly sociable folks - stop thinking that because my interests are quiet, they are not true interests at all. People do connect over books. And just because I have fewer connections than you does not mean they aren't as deep.
Perhaps because I have fewer, the ones I do make are stronger, by virtue of my not spreading myself too thinly across a wide-ranging, numerous social circle, built on nothing more than a desire to say "Look at me! I have friends!"
That is all.
Oh, and...thoughts?
Now I didn't say this in a mocking tone, or at all in a cruel way. I was merely referring to the frown on her face while me and this man were talking about a particular author. My friend had heard of the writer but isn't a fan.
Anyway, she told me I had to realise not everyone was into the same things I was and I said, "I know...I was just commenting that it felt as if me and him were...not ganging up, but forming our own little bookworm club and you didn't know what we were on about." Just...acknowledging that we'd been away in our own little world talking about a writer of whom we're both fans, so she knew I wasn't completely oblivious to her presence there.
She went on to say, "After all, there are things I know about that you don't, and vice versa."
I started to defend myself and tell her, "I know we all have different interests; I was just acknowledging the fact-" intending to add, "-we may have excluded you."
Well by this time she was in her stride. "After all, how often do you go out?"
"Huh?"
She asked again.
"Well...every day."
"No you don't."
"Pardon me? Yes I do!"
"As often as me? I don't think so."
I asked her, how does she know how often I go out, then she asked do I go out a lot, or do I read a lot. I said both. She said "You don't read when you go out. You can't have it both ways."
"Yes I can. I go out of the house. And I read."
"Well then you're not meeting people are you? If you just want to spend your time reading you may as well stay indoors. There's no point going out if you're going to spend all your time reading."
"Uh...change of scenery?"
"But you're not talking to people if you go out and sit alone, reading."
"Maybe I don't want to!"
"Then why go out?"
*sigh*
Upshot is, she prefers to go out and meet people whereas I never go out (how she knows this I don't know) and when I do, I take a book with me and never talk to people, so there's no point in me leaving the house. This is the same person who told me months ago if no-one ever reads what you write, you're not a writer. Basically, you're not a writer 'til you're published. I have a lot of respect for her; she has oodles of integrity but...damn. Some people just don't get it.
I'm not a people person but if I never meet people and never talk to them, how did I manage to get into a debate with a mutual acquaintance about a particular author in front of her? I was about to apologise for excluding her from the conversation but she thought my apology was what excluded her, as in - emphasising that me and our male friend were readers, and she is not.
She's not a reader, see, because she's always out of the house, here, there, everywhere, spending time with her family, doing things, working and so on...and she insists, downright insists, that she goes out more than I do. And I never meet new people because I've always got my nose in a book.
The thing is, I do meet new people. I meet people all the time. I just don't see why I should waste my breath on them if we're not on the same level. Take tt42 for instance. Now, we've never met but we will someday for sure (beware of that day, folks. Beware). I also know for sure that if I said to her, face to face, "Christ, I need some me-time, I'm off to my room," or "I'm going out, I want to write a few thousand words," she wouldn't take offence or see that as a snub. She'd probably think, "Oh thank God. Thought she'd never piss off."
See...it's not a matter of writers being anti-social. It's not even a writer thing, I think. It's a matter of knowing what you like in other people, what you're willing to put up with, what you're not...and finding people who agree with you on that.
I believe too many people form friendships because of proximity. "You live near me so let's hang out." Fuck that. I'd rather have no local friends than pootle around town with folks I have little more in common with than the city we inhabit. Friendship by default? No thanks. I'd rather spend time with folks I like.
I guess I'm just thinking out loud, rejigging a few ideas I have about my social life and how I spend my time. I sincerely believe that writers are misunderstood - we're seen as anti-social, as I've said, even though we're people-watchers. We have to be. So we're on the outside looking in much of the time.
Added to which my attitude to people regardless of my occupation is, "If I don't like you, fuck off." Life's too short to socialise for the sake of it. I don't see why I should flit here there and everywhere just so people won't call me anti-social, say I have no life or accuse me of 'never going out'.
I do go out, but when I do it's not to be visible. It's to go out with a purpose - pay bills, meet someone (yes, really!), have lunch, change of scenery, write, read, go for a walk. Sometimes on my own, sometimes with a friend. But people I count as true friends don't need to be in my face all the time, talking at me, being in my business. I prefer companions whose company I can keep with no pressure to be 'on'. People who are as accepting of me as I am of them. I'm a writer, not an actress. If you want someone to perform, go to the theatre. This is my life, not a stage set to entertain you.
I'm sick of being expected to work the room when I just don't want to. Hell, if I was that awful a person I'd not have any friends at all. I'd never have chatted with aforementioned acquaintance about Jane Austen, the Brontes, Dickens, Plato and the like. I'd never have talked to the hunky librarian about Anais Nin and The Torture Garden.
So please, more visibly sociable folks - stop thinking that because my interests are quiet, they are not true interests at all. People do connect over books. And just because I have fewer connections than you does not mean they aren't as deep.
Perhaps because I have fewer, the ones I do make are stronger, by virtue of my not spreading myself too thinly across a wide-ranging, numerous social circle, built on nothing more than a desire to say "Look at me! I have friends!"
That is all.
Oh, and...thoughts?