The introvert, or the hermit?

From time to time, circumstances plunge me into situations where either I’m really uncomfortable or I question everything I ever knew about social interaction, including my past experience, which is a little unnerving.

I will acknowledge up front that this is at least partly because I am an introvert from birth. Given some of my reactions during and after some social situations recently, I’m not sure if I’m getting more introverted (because is that even a thing after 48 years?) or if it’s just yet another sub-wonderful effect of perimenopause. Either way, I’m cool with being an introvert, but an extreme introvert — no, thank you.

As I try to type this with a super high level of distraction on a blizzardy day with seven people in the 1100-square-foot house …. I can confirm the following:

Being around people is exhausting. A single basketball game in a crowded gym is fine, but a whole five or six hours of a youth volleyball tournament will kill me dead (almost). Eleven zillion errands are fine if I go alone, but I need five or fewer errands if I have someone along. A meeting that involves interactions for two or three hours is fine, but double that, and I’m going to visibly run out of steam. If I get together with friends, I prefer one or two, but maybe eight max, and I’m likely to give up (or at least be ready to give up) after a couple hours.

I need quiet time to recharge. I require an hour by myself in the morning to be ready to talk to anyone else, even people I love. In a situation where I’m around people for a whole day, maybe a conference, it is not unlikely that I’ll eventually hide out in a restroom for five minutes — more than once. I daydream and come up with grand plans all the time, and this is no exaggeration, and then I feel terrible that I rarely bring a grand plan to fruition.

I’m definitely to the point where a grand plan involving other people that might not come to fruition — or maybe starts big with all kinds of collaboration and all but stops, like this blog, ha — is something I rarely even propose anymore. Something like the Bertrand Town Square requires just exactly the right partner, and ideally just the one partner. (We will see if that one works. I really hope it does. The plan is to have subscription and sponsorship/donation plans in place by mid-April, which ought to make it more sustainable.)

Myers & Briggs evaluation — although I’m a skeptic of the highest order when it comes to the veracity of personality quizzes, I also never don’t take them, nor do I cease to be a little amazed at how close some of the answers come. Here’s an excerpt from the MBTI website:

INFP: Idealistic, loyal to their values and to people who are important to them. Want to live a life that is congruent with their values. Curious, quick to see possibilities, can be catalysts for implementing ideas. Seek to understand people and to help them fulfill their potential. Adaptable, flexible, and accepting unless a value is threatened.

Indeed, I like how that sounds. Definitely the good-parts version.

Apparently INFP is termed the Mediator. Honestly, this website has a very nice assessment and a lot of free information, but it also has opportunities to monetize based on people’s willingness to pay to navel-gaze (“Instantly unlock the other 95 percent of what we know about you!”). I’m not that target. But I do return to the website from time to time to make some attempt to understand why I’m doing what I’m doing.

But, back to the main point. Introvert, yes. I think that’s well established. But hermit? We used to watch a show on one of the streaming services that came from one of the formerly-very-influential production companies about people who lived in unexpected but very hermit-y places. One guy lived in a series of caves and walked around barefoot, and he sometimes went to a gas station but waited until only the clerk was there before he’d enter. One guy and his wife lived in a tree and milked goats and had some crazy warning setup in case people approached.

There are definitely days I can sympathize with this behavior.

On the other hand, I do like my 21st Century conveniences. My heat pump is humming right along, and the lights are on. I half-remember that the tree guy’s wife left the tree and him because the toileting situation was subpar, which, same — I would do the same. Also I do like community, to some degree. Communal worship is good. Starting something that’s newspaper-esque is good.

Taking a longer view, though, there are things I did as a young adult that I can no longer feature being able to do.

Some high-teen-number of credit hours’ worth of college classes and then some organization meetings and wrap the night up at the bar — and then meet up with people for math homework — and then get up and do it again the next day?

Oh. Um, no. Where’s my cave.

Work a day job and then drive out 35 miles and irrigate and wrap the night up at the bar — then drive home and do it again at the pre-crack of pre-dawn?

And THEN get married and have a second job and still sometimes irrigate and go to the bar?

Ohhhhhhhhhhhkay. She was cuh-razy, younger me was. And more than a little thoughtless. But she got a ton of work and socializing done. The workload I could go back to, maybe, though working at a place for a guy is not at all on my radar. The socializing, not going to happen.

I don’t think I’m a hermit, but there are minutes it is super appealing. It’s not a great way to be a spouse or parent, honestly, just like the opposite is also not a great way to be a spouse or parent. (Related, have you read this? Because if not, then do. Thank God that some people are cut out to be teachers in spite of parents’ best efforts.)

However, if you find me in a cabin in the mountains, with electricity and appropriate plumbing, and enough Internet to download ebooks and text my life-long friends, only coming down to buy flour and sugar once a year, but maybe on the edge of the mountains so I can still see the horizon nicely without them, I guess don’t be alarmed. It just means I decided never to say “yes” to another committee or another round of 4-H or another pretty much anything. It’s fine.