I’m really, really bad about not calling home, but Thursday night I dialed my parent’s number and reached my mother. We spoke about what was new with me, but it wasn’t much, really. “Well, your life sounds boring!” my mom teased. I laughed.
Life here is busy, but you have to take into account what I’m going to start calling the Louisiana Molasses Factor. People take time to talk and build relationships. “An early start” is 9:00 or 10:00 a.m. 6:30 a.m. sounds shockingly early to folks here – like the equivalent of 5:00 a.m. in Georgia or 4:30 a.m. to the people I encountered up in Hagerstown, Maryland. It all factors together to slow down the pace and increase quality of life, and naturally, it affects business. By Friday night this week, I needed a little getaway.
Friday night always presents a unique challenge for me. I want to rest, but also act. I want to go out and interact socially, but I’m never sure I’m prepared for social exertion. I want coffee… but it’s night time.
So when I went out to find a good time on Friday, I wandered into several “fun” places and then left again because they were too crowded – and somehow, I ended up at Barnes & Noble. I knew I couldn’t read fiction in a uncomfortable, commercialized bookstore, even if I found a story I liked. So I wandered over to the business section and found a book called The Art of Talking to Anyone by Rosalie Maggio. Since I talk to people all day for a living, the title grabbed me. Treating myself to a latte, I sat down in the bookstore’s cafe to examine the pages.
Then I realized I was alone in a bookstore with coffee on Friday night, the perfect bookish-introvert stereotype, but reading a book about talking to people. Aren’t introverts usually expected to embrace introversion? What communication student actually goes to a bookstore alone to learn about communication?
My phone battery died while I was in the bookstore. This put a handicap on my note-taking as I read, so I made the trip home to get my phone charger. When I returned to the bookstore, someone had bought The Art of Talking to Anyone. I chose another book with a less ironic title and enjoyed my evening reading over coffee.
Boring, maybe. But just what I needed.
~ The Dauntless Princess ~