A downside to cooking for myself more is that I don’t have as many conversations with waitstaff anymore.
That statement makes me seem a bit starved for human interaction, doesn’t it?
And I guess I am, a bit. Just a bit, though. I’m pretty happy right now with my social life. I spend a day or two a week with one or several of my friends. Tomorrow night I’ll be meeting a friends’ wife for the first time, having dinner at their house. Of course, earlier this week I hosted my monthly D&D game; prior to the game I spent the afternoon and had lunch with Terry. I’m in constant contact with Tracy via text, and regularly trade emails with Kevin.
Yeah, I’m happy with my social life right now. I have good friends around me.
The small part I miss, though, is the small random interactions, the chance encounters. If I’m honest, though, those were always few and far between in my life. Maybe they stand out in my memory only because I didn’t have regular contact with close friends? And because of the rarity of the chance encounter, I have to admit I wasn’t very good at them: I often ran out of things to say, or didn’t know how to continue the conversation, or failed to express an interest in talking to them again. Or, worse, did those things in an awkward way.
If I think about it now, though, I spend a bit more time at the grocery store these days. There’s a chance for interaction. I still visit my local coffee shop regularly and talk to my coffee guy and the girl who works there, and could possibly get to know some of the other regulars there. I see pretty much the same faces every day on my bus ride to and from work. The people who run the Thai restaurant near my house still recognize me, even though I don’t go in as often.
I still have opportunities for random conversations. Maybe the lack was just a mental blind spot for me? I’ve been feeling the winter doldrums quite a bit for the last month or two; hopefully with the return of sunnier weather and longer days, my mood will pick up.