REJECTION NOTICES

Communication is a two way street. In my case there's precious little traffic in either direction.
I should've realized this much earlier. I just don't communicate very well. I'm neither good at social chit-chat, nor brilliantly skilled at imparting much other than facts and commentary.

This may seem a rather a strange assertion from a reasonably literate and educated person, someone who has blogged so long and so much, who seems to live by the written text and the controlled sentence.
But please remember, you are reading these words. You aren't hearing me speak.

Since Savage Kitten and I broke up, I have been spending several hours every weekend at the office.
She and I no longer communicate very well - I wonder if we ever did - and I find myself brittle in her presence, yet at a loss when she isn't home.

I don't like staying in the apartment, but other than the office where should I go?

Most other people aren't that enjoyable to be around. Especially not when their interests and activities baffle the crap out of me, and my own interests bore the heck out of them.


THE DISASTER OF OTHER PEOPLE'S COMPANY

Many men in San Francisco tend to be rather dull, speaking mostly of sports, occasionally of their wives or girlfriends. Other than that, they indulge in boasting, vulgarity, and crass humour.
Women in this city are very shallow creatures on the whole. They shop, they get tattoos, and they petulantly demand attention.

This is a very superficial place, whose unpleasant natives have far more attitude than is merited.
...

Actually, that's probably not it at all.
It's my fault, I just can't understand conversation.

What I rarely notice when dealing with other people is the subtext and the fabric of underlying messages. When people speak, part of the communicative process is always unstated.
Such things as contextual reality, body language, and subconscious evaluation by both parties are key elements; observation and instinctive empathetic responses are fundamental to smooth and rewarding social interaction.

I know all this, but it's still foreign to me.

My best conversations are hardly ever face to face.

That's why I'm sitting here at my desk on a Saturday evening, essentially talking to myself.


FRACTURED PARADIGMS

Two very similar activities express different aspects of sociability, namely eating together and drinking in company.
The difference between the two could well be likened to carnivores communally chomping down on the kill, versus the sometimes tense coexistence demonstrated by animals at the watering hole.

Voluntary socializing.

In a city filled with alcoholics like San Francisco, going to a bar by oneself is an easy way of being social. Drinking in a crowded establishment lets you remain semi-anonymous, you don't have to talk unless you want to. And as long as you don't misbehave or open your mouth too much, you are being a perfect member of the herd.
Just smile over your whiskey, and all we be well. You will be appreciated, and more than likely welcomed back.

Eating follows a different pattern, however.

Involuntary solitude.

Ever since I left the computer company over ten years ago I have gotten used to the idea that for many people lunch is private time and an escape from the enforced social-overstimulation of having to associate with other people in an office environment.

[Yes, I know that many of my colleagues go out to eat together on occasion, but I'm used to eating lunch at my desk by now. I am, after all, not that friendly anymore.]

It's quite different after the work-day is over. Eating dinner at a restaurant alone absolutely defines one as a reject. It's what sour old farts who live in residential hotels do, as well as people who are too eccentric to get along with civilized society.
Druggies, degenerates, and strangers, lone wolves and social lepers.

The sense of being on the outside is far worse at night.

Dinner by oneself has absolutely nothing to recommend it.

I don't know what is more irritating - the apathetic inattention given to single diners in some restaurants, versus the expedient service that tries to get you fed, paid up, and pushed out the door as quickly as possible.
Maybe it's the paucity of choices, and the aura of pariah status.

I had better go get a slice of pizza before my blood sugar plummets.
After all, man does not live by cups of tea alone.



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