I'm not very good at talking to certain people, for different reasons, of course. The bigger the group, the more I tend to fade into the background. As I'm fading, I usually run into Brandon Campbell on my way. We talk anywhere from fifteen minutes to half an hour before we usually get noticed and pulled into some game or other. We then play that game for awhile, and then both quit. A little while later I've fallen back to my previous faded position, and soon Brandon goes off to converse with someone else (as is polite, in such a large group) and I finish my fading.
My problem with that situation is that I always feel awkward when talking to Brandon, because I feel like I'm doing a lot, if not all, of the talking. Also, I feel that he is quite a bit more intelligent than I am, so I feel like he possibly doesn't want to listen to someone that he can't be edified by. He's a great guy. We're on the mission council together, and usually can't look at each other without laughing. Still, it's always one of those awkward situations for me.
And when I say I fade, I mean it. I become pretty much invisible. I can just sit and observe and no one speaks to me or asks if I would be interested in joining into conversation or games. Just try and invite yourself, you say? When I interject phrases into conversations going on, it seems like they hear me and see me, but don't want to--as if their brains aren't wanting to register that there's a being speaking. I tried to invite myself into a rotation of ping pong, and when I got up to ask they just started another game. Really, I'm pretty invisible. The only way someone seems to notice me is if I get hit by something. They see me there, apologize, and quickly move on. Hence why I hate big group things--especially if I am in the mood to speak to other people instead of observe.
Then there's the threesome. You're in a car, and you know both people, but one you don't know very well, and the other you know better but don't know what to say to him/her because you don't exactly know where your spot in the social hierarchy is. So, you sit there quietly. And, in the course of the car ride the one you know better starts talking to you, but nothing really registers. By the time you've figured out that you're at a reasonably comfortable spot in the social hierarchy, it once again becomes awkward, because that puts the other person in the car as the odd man out: the bottom of the hierarchy, so to speak.
The whole car ride becomes one large, awkward situation bomb that will detonate if you say anything, because you don't want to spend all your time talking to the one you know better for fear of alienating the one you don't know as well, and since you don't know how well these two people know each other, it is impossible to tell which subject of conversation to choose that everyone can participate in. Once again, I remain silent in such situations. However, I don't have the talent of fading into the background here. Person you know better will keep saying things to try and spark conversation with you, and the other, less known person will occasionally comment, but you know that you're the one that connects both of these people. The heart of the conversation rests with you. What do I do? Panic and say nothing in that panic, of course.
Finally, there's the one on one situations. There's always those couple people that are my friends, but I'm always in a state of annoyance with them. So, when I get together to do something with one of these friends, I'm reminded anew of why I'm always so annoyed when I think about them. Wishing and wishing and wishing with no action, leeching, my life's terrible--those kinds of things that people go on about that are okay once in awhile, but when talked about all the time really bother me. However, I'm too nice/polite/aware of society's expectations to let them know how annoyed I am at them. There will always be that one person who I can be really upset and angry at because of what they are doing and how it will affect their future, but when I see them I never say anything. And there will always be the one person that I can be annoyed/angry at, see and then just get quiet and sad.
I think I expect too much of people. If I expected less of them I probably wouldn't be so socially awkward and critical; I would probably be more pleased with the world and the people in it. As it is, the more I see of the world, the more I am dissatisfied with it.
