Ah, the weekend get together. This previous weekend’s get together was a bit larger than normal. Part of the family that rarely get together were coming in at the request of the matriarch for a reunion of sorts. She’s the last of her siblings and her husband’s siblings to still be alive and kicking at close to 100 years old. When she asks, very few would willingly say no. Up until my parents generation, both the matriarch and patriarch’s families were big. We’re talking a minimum of 6 kids in each, with previous generations having as many as 12. As a result I’ve run into complete strangers in different states who I’ve never met that are in fact cousins. The only reason I know we’re related is the unique spelling of a very common last name.
There was in fact at this reunion a relation that my immediate family had never met (several actually). She was a brassy gal with a booming voice. The kind of woman that never seems to be able to modulate the volume of her voice, and is always a touch too loud. Couple that with a try hard attitude, and a desire that others like her and it was a combination ripe for critical observation.
I could ascribe motives for her behavior, but then I’d just be projecting my feelings and motives onto her behavior. Similar to how animal rights activists anthropomorphize animals in their zealous pursuit of superior rights for animals above their own species. Instead I’ll describe what she did and one conversation that I can relate.
She went from table to table and from group to group attempting to join in the conversations. She was welcomed easily and without fuss as she did this. She is family after all. She would interject into the conversation, attempt to find a common thread, and then once she’d run out of chit chat, she’d eject to find another group of people to introduce herself to. All well and fine. These aren’t what one would consider earth shattering conversation, just the amiable reconnect with people we know and love, and who we don’t get to see often enough.
Eventually she got around to the single cat lady of the family. A driven gal who spent her time focused on her career and education only to find that most men no longer have what it takes to get through the screening criteria of her alpha filter. She has recognized that she prices herself out of the market and that the pool of men she has to choose from is too small for her to find a mate. If she thinks about it, she will admit that it depresses her, but for the most part she tries to not think about it. She is very good at what she does and is currently a mid-level manager for a small international corporation. In a big corporation, being a mid-level manager is nothing to write home about, in this firm she’s only two steps below the CEO. Of course there are only 5 levels to the corporate hierarchy, but you get the idea.
After the introductions the conversation started to peter our rather quickly as it was quite obvious the two didn’t have much in common. Brassy gal asked Cat lady what her job was. Cat lady explained her position and role. Brassy gal looked confused.
Brassy: “So…you work with computers?”
Cat (nonplussed): Yes, I suppose you could say that. How about you?
Brassy: I load trucks for [big retail corporation].
Cat (flash of contempt that was quickly masked): How nice…
Realizing her class snobbery was showing, Cat lady attempts a recovery.
Cat (trying to cover up her faux pas): So, you have pretty good benefits?
Brassy (looking like she wants to be somewhere else): No, the benefits suck.
Having been in a few socially awkward situations myself, this conversation had me laughing out loud. It wasn’t that this conversation was unique, rather that it is so common. These types of detail oriented conversations of who, what, when, where, are the fall back desperation move that we all tend to do when looking for a common thread to keep a conversation going. That attempt to find a life line when two people don’t know what to talk about. Bland and boring.
