Antisocial or Introvert?

Last weekend, Andy and I were sitting in an All Bar One at Birmingham International, watching the departures screen push back our flight by 15 minutes every 10 minutes for about 40 minutes straight. We were just about to get the bill, when the man at the table next to us said, “Something’s up with the Flybe flights this afternoon—they’re all getting delayed or cancelled.”

I jumped in with something like, “Yep, it’s crazy!” and went straight back to my cappuccino, avoiding eye contact and angling my body inward, toward Andy.

The man carried on. He was with his wife of 26 years. He had just returned from Copenhagen earlier in the week, where he’d strategically flown in with a different airline than he flew out with. The prices for round-trip journeys were exorbitant, he explained.

Andy chuckled and told a story about how he and his brother had flown to Dublin for the rugby the weekend before, and how his brother’s flight was far more expensive because he was flying from Exeter, not Edinburgh.

Great. Here we go. Think fast, Margaret. Think fast!

I racked my brain for a quick, compelling, exclusive conversation starter that would pull Andy back from the gravitational pull of a friendly stranger. But words escaped me. And then it was too late. They were talking about red cards and the Millennium Stadium and the Scotland team’s naiveté. They were watching iPhone footage of the Haka. This was not good.

I’d lost my window and the worst had happened: we were having a conversation with strangers.

Eventually, I suggested to Andy that we go to the Customer Service Desk and ask for an update on our flight. We said our goodbyes, and I muttered to Andy, “Thank God that’s over!”

He said, “Oh Mog! You are the definition of antisocial! We could have stayed in there and chatted with them and had a lovely time!”

There was no arguing with that. I am antisocial. It’s not good. But it’s also honest. I go back and forth on whether I should try to change or not. I’ve been this way for a while, ever since high school when my friend Connie and I would sit against a white brick wall near the parking lot during lunch, soaking up the sunshine and dreaming of 1:40pm when we’d be freed. It wasn’t as if we didn’t have a place in the cafeteria. We had enough friends. But it was just easier to meet at the wall and not have to bother with discussions about teachers, football games, ASB elections and other topics that reminded us of our imprisonment.

I mean, when am I going to come out of my shell already? HA!

Image by FotoDawg via Wikimedia Commons

When I try to make myself feel better about being antisocial, I decide that I’m an introvert. Yeah, that’s it! Don’t blame me for being antisocial; I’m just an introvert!

However, the truth is that I'm not sure what I am. I've tried to take quizzes online, but I tend to quit halfway through. Introvert or extrovert, one thing's for sure: I'm lazy. 

A lot of people who know me would assume I'm an extrovert. I do love attention. Yesterday's iMovie is proof of that. But I the true test is supposedly as follows:

• Do you get your energy from spending time alone? You're an introvert.

• Do you get your energy from spending time with groups? You're an extrovert. 

It doesn't have anything to do with being shy or outgoing. It's about how you recharge. If this is true, then I suppose, if I had to be one or the other, I actually would be an introvert. 

OH SNAP! So, I just took a quiz and guess what?

I'm an AMBIVERT! This is a surprising twist. 

Take the quiz yourself. There are only 12 questions, so it's easy, if not scientifically irrelevant. 


See ya next time, 

Margaret

P.S. That photo reminds me: some baby tortoises were just born in the Galapagos Islands—the first in a century! I'm not an animal lover, but for some reason this made me so happy that I shouted "YESSSSSS!" when I read it.