Thread Drift

[shootingstar]

I relate to both TE forumites who are part of a couple and those who live alone 'cause:

we maintain 2 homes in 2 provinces. My partner isn't always living in the same city where I work full-time. We spend time together in each home city location for chunks of the year which gets compounded by my limited vacation time due to a full-time job. Hence, my motivation to form more deeper friendships in my job-oriented city is less. After working for several employers in my career, my incentive to create personal friendships via other employees, dropped off a long time ago. The only local good friend is someone who works for the same employer but she is in a totally different dept. where our work roles would never cross. (Thank goodness!) Instead she and I met initially...in the employee collective bike cage. A friendship can begin in a collective bike cage, not during a bike ride.

As a couple for last 24 yrs., dearie and I just haven't joined up group rides often each year. We seem to go on one...um...1-2 times per year, if that. He and I are friendly introverts. He is well-known in the Vancouver area cycling advocacy circles and has many cycling advocacy contacts in the city and across British Columbia. But strangely, he very rarely goes cycling with these folks on his own personal trips and seldom goes out strictly just for a personal coffee/drink with such friends if there isn't some cycling matter he wants to chat up. Personally I find it abit odd, but I love dearie for being a friendly outlier.

I'm the one that still maintains some contact with long-time friends across Canada...even if they can't be immediately in the same city to help me. He is not like that all. But he is entirely content with this. Literally a friendly hermit but saves his personal "socializing" time for myself, his children and grandchildren.

But true, how helpful it is to have a local trustworthy friend when one is grieving, sick or injured.

[OakLeaf]

Lots here. Hugs to everyone. NbyNW, that's tough. Best wishes on the transition. Catrin, hugs to you too. Shootingstar, glad you're taking the time you need to mend.

Emily, you nailed it with me. I've heard it described before that some people gain energy from being with others, where other people have to spend it. I'm a spender for sure. When I got hurt and had to cut way back on riding, it was a major hit to my social life, but I really wasn't interested in "finding" something else to substitute. So I got even more isolated, which is one of the dysfunctional strategies I use to manage my life, and that's not good. Thank goodness for yoga.

My bike club started a slow ride and I'm actually planning on trying to ride with them in the morning. I'm a little apprehensive, both because I haven't been on the road bike for a year and a half, and because of the ride leader. During my "down time" one of the faster riders married her. I haven't met her face to face yet, but she friended me on Facebook and within two months was posting racist bile on my page. I unfriended her right away needless to say. There are people I know and like who usually do this ride too, but it's just kind of weird for me.


Oh PS I got a new motorcycle

[Pax]

*ears perking up*

New motorcycle?? Details please.

[Crankin]

Oak, that racist thing would do it for me... but if it's a ride where the pace is right and the others are OK, well, I would try. I went on a group ride last fall with a leader that's known for being "strange." It started in a nearby town, so I said, "why not?" Well, he was more than weird. This is a guy who got punched by a cyclist from another club, because he was riding erratically on a group ride through Concord Center last year. And, he's mean. So, we were kinda in the middle of nowhere, near the NH border and my GPS beeped to turn. He went straight. A few minutes later he says, we're lost! Like, OK, why didn't you turn according to the route you made up! To make a long story short, the temp was dropping, rain was threatening, and yours truly led the group back to a town where we could eat lunch and was about 5 miles from the start. It's too bad, because the other riders were nice, but I was so pissed at him, and focusing on taking responsibility for the group, I didn't talk too much.
I didn't realize how many people feel like socializing is expending energy and dread it. I guess I need to find some more extroverts like me. I do enjoy my quiet time, but not too much! I think I am so "on" at my job, that I crave good, fun social interaction with like minded people. Funny, all of the people I've met from TE seem quite out going to me.
Glad you are hanging in there, ShootingStar.

[lph]

I didn't realize how many people feel like socializing is expending energy and dread it. I guess I need to find some more extroverts like me. I do enjoy my quiet time, but not too much! I think I am so "on" at my job, that I crave good, fun social interaction with like minded people. Funny, all of the people I've met from TE seem quite out going to me.
Glad you are hanging in there, ShootingStar.

I think that's actually pretty much the definition of an introvert, someone who finds that socializing drains energy rather than giving energy.

But it's quite possible to be both outgoing and introverted, I am. I'm very social and chatty at work and in most situations, but socializing is an effort, especially at home in the evenings. It's sort of like exercise - I like it, I look forward to it, I can even feel quite "high" immediately afterwards, but boy, do I need to rest in the end. It even extends to close family, I could happily be alone at home for a week before I started to feel lonely. I try to socialize by culturing friendships at work, keeping up on Facebook and doing physical activities with people, as that keeps my home time free :-)On the other hand, my dh is very quiet and subdued in his interactions with people, but has a much higher tolerance for entertaining at home, for example.

I think the introvert/extrovert thing can be worth discussing with close friends and family, to keep from hurting peoples feelings.

[rocknrollgirl]

I had an entire class of introverts last year. We used to joke that we had found "our people". I am actually very outgoing and will talk to anybody. My DH jokes that I am famous for picking people up at trailheads. Most of our close friends I met while chatting it up in a parking lot before our after an activity.

Anyway, I used to think I was socially awkward despite my outgoing nature. I can sit and talk to a friend for hours, but a cocktail party at work. Forget it. I am lost. So I made a comment about being socially awkward in class and this brilliant young woman looked at me and said. Introverted, not awkward. She defined introverts as someone that recharges their battery by having quiet time and someone that is an extrovert recharges by being social.

Nailed it. That is me. I think part of my need for quiet at home stems from two things. One, growing up in a very dysfunctional household , and teaching high school. When I come home, and one the weekends, I need quiet down time. Fortunately I married a man that respects that and gets it. After we get back from riding and papers are graded, I love to curl up on the corner of the couch and read for an hour or two. Recharge complete.

So I told my class of brilliant introverts, marry well if you marry. Find someone that gets it. I also told them when they went off to college this year to at least make an attempt to interact with the other humans!!! I was a great class to teach, so a fun group.

What has worked for me with company and travel with friends and family is to always make sure I have a place to retreat to. We are in the process of planning a mt biking weekend with our riding friends. renting a house. So as long as the house has enough space, and DH and I have a room of our own I can retreat to, I will be fine.

[OakLeaf]

It's sort of like exercise - I like it, I look forward to it, I can even feel quite "high" immediately afterwards, but boy, do I need to rest in the end.... I think the introvert/extrovert thing can be worth discussing with close friends and family, to keep from hurting peoples feelings.

Yes and yes! And yes, RnRgirl, I definitely need to be able to retreat. Going out for a run helps a lot, but being able to close a door is super important to me too.


I got out on the club ride this morning, did around 29 at a nice relaxed pace by the time I rode to the start and back. It felt good, it was nice to ride with people, it didn't really feel like I'd been away at all. So my scientific investigation has determined that the amount of time it takes to forget how to ride a bicycle is less than ten years but greater than 14 months. (Well not really, I had been riding the commuter all this winter and last.)


Pax, the new moto is a little Kawasaki EX300 and so far I am really loving it. I've been downsizing lately, I'm kind of over bikes that are too big and too fast. It's actually not all that light (spec is like 385 wet), being liquid cooled, steel frame, etc., but it's low and narrow, much lower center of gravity than inline four 600s, has plenty of motor for passing on two-lanes when I need it, and it fits. like. a. dream. I've never had a moto that fit this well and I just couldn't be happier with it.

Picking it up from the dealer was kind of an adventure in itself. DH had gone out of town and needed to stay an extra day, I didn't have another ride, and I did NOT want to wait another day or two to get my bike. So I packed up all my moto gear on the commuter bici (pants and back protector in one saddlebag, jacket and gloves in the other, one boot sticking out of each and helmet cargo-netted on top ), rode that four miles to the bus stop, locked it up, consolidated all the gear except for the helmet in a huge drawstring bag, spent the next hour and a half on buses to the dealership, picked up the moto, rode it home, parked it in the garage, got my running gear on, ran to where I'd parked the bici and rode that home. Four modes of transport (five if you count running and walking separately) and not one of them a car.

[emily_in_nc]

But it's quite possible to be both outgoing and introverted, I am. I'm very social and chatty at work and in most situations, but socializing is an effort, especially at home in the evenings. It's sort of like exercise - I like it, I look forward to it, I can even feel quite "high" immediately afterwards, but boy, do I need to rest in the end. It even extends to close family, I could happily be alone at home for a week before I started to feel lonely. I try to socialize by culturing friendships at work, keeping up on Facebook and doing physical activities with people, as that keeps my home time free :-)

This is me to a "t". Nice description. Many/most people I meet would never guess that I consider myself an introvert and have consistently tested that way on the Myers-Briggs (INFJ). I am capable of being chatty, silly, humorous (I use humor to overcome my social awkwardness at times), and downright outgoing in the right situation. When I used to entertain family a lot (back when my dad was still alive and our family was a lot closer), I was often the center of attention, the most outgoing person in the room. But those "efforts" wore me OUT.

When I was working I much preferred to be social at work and then leave my weeknights free for just DH and me at home. And on weekends, bike club rides were okay during the day, but I hated having actual social plans for weekends and would sometimes make up excuses not to go to parties and get-togethers as I dreaded them so. But if I did actually go to one, more often than not I had a fun time and was glad I went. But I'd need some down time after. And if either set of our parents came to stay with us for a few days, it would take days of "recharge" time for me after they left.

Being an introvert doesn't mean I never feel lonely or feel like I'm missing out on a lot by not being more social -- I do. But it's harder to overcome all the barriers and protections I have built up to avoid social interactions any deeper than a quick chat in passing. And the fact that my DH is even more introverted and less social than I doesn't help matters any!

[Crankin]

Well, even though I am an extrovert, i don't usually socialize on week nights, when it's a work day. DH and I do go out occasionally during the week, but we generally are not meeting others.

[rebeccaC]

But it's quite possible to be both outgoing and introverted

Agree....I like the quiet type of contentment, sitting reading a book, cycling/hiking alone, quiet reflection, solitude etc. but also the feeling of being in the moment, being energized and focused in outgoing social activities like leading my work group, meeting an attractive stranger in a club (giddy happiness), the energy of a crowded club concert, a large dinner party, having a good friend/s visiting for a few days etc. I just see it as making positive choices that lead me towards enjoying the moment. I guess since I prefer more degrees of freedom than an introvert or extrovert label I’m an ambivert.

[salsabike]

I guess since I prefer more degrees of freedom than an introvert or extrovert label I’m an ambivert.

Oh, "ambivert"---love that.

[Pax]

Agree....I like the quiet type of contentment, sitting reading a book, cycling/hiking alone, quiet reflection, solitude etc. but also the feeling of being in the moment, being energized and focused in outgoing social activities like leading my work group, meeting an attractive stranger in a club (giddy happiness), the energy of a crowded club concert, a large dinner party, having a good friend/s visiting for a few days etc. I just see it as making positive choices that lead me towards enjoying the moment. I guess since I prefer more degrees of freedom than an introvert or extrovert label I’m an ambivert.

My sister!