In my part of the country, restrictions are being lifted and people who are vaccinated are now gathering together even indoors without masks. This has been a great relief to many people who found the enforced isolation during the past year very difficult to deal with. I am one of the people for whom being solitary was not a problem. I am not a misanthrope, exactly, in that I do not actively shun the company of others. But the things that I enjoy doing the most (reading, writing, thinking) are those that are best done in solitude. Hence I like to maintain large expanses of time alone between my socializing with others.
But sometimes I wonder whether my sympathies with Rat should be a cause for concern …
We are all Rat sometimes!
I deal with pretty bad anxiety, and the pandemic hit just as I was starting to feel comfortable going out and socializing after my latest bout of anxiety-induced hermitage. I want to go out and do the social things, but…
I was given a Meyers-Briggs test many moons ago by an ex-girlfriend who was a trainer. On three axes, I was way over on the side you’d expect for a liberal, atheist, science person. On the introvert-extrovert axis, however, I was dead center.
I have a new shirt for this. I got it as a joke to wear to an upcoming family get-together, but it applies. It reads
“Where are stay at home orders when we really need them?”
I’m going to keep it handy.
There was another t-shirt which read something like “When this virus is over, there are some of you I still want to stay away from me.”
““When this virus is over, there are some of you I still want to stay away from me.””
That’s nice too. I should add — over the last 35 years my in-laws have become accustomed to my sense of humor, and take the shirt messages as they’re meant: good humor.