Was at a team offsite recently where a young man joined our group for dinner. One of my colleagues had met him in the breakroom earlier in the day and invited him over. This was V's first job out of college and he was full of enthusiasm to do his best at work, get integrated into the community in the office and around town. As we chatted, he described his challenges in achieving the later goal. His girlfriend was in a different city completing her graduate program. He did not know to drive and preferred to live in places where it was easy to get around on public transportation.
The combination of being single and without a car greatly limited his social opportunities. We were happy to have him hang out with us for the evening and V for his part was grateful for the company. He is not much older than J and I could not help feeling some maternal concern for him. V asked me for ideas for what he could do to better network around. Based on everything I had heard upto that point, it seemed like he was doing all he could given his constraints. I advised him to learn driving and get a car to experience the country and a sense of freedom. I am certain this was not the first time V had heard such wisdom but there is something to be said for timing of certain messages in life.
I hope my timing was good and will help V feel less lost. It made me sad to hear him talk about not having friends and feeling alone in a city he felt cold and unresponsive to his overtures of friendship. In part because of J who like V lives alone in a big city. But it also reminded me of my early years in America - first as newly married and then as a single-mother.
My natural introversion was definitely enabled by the sense of being in a community that was largely indifferent to me. V is very extroverted and experiencing a similar environment in a completely different way. I was glad to be left alone for the most part, he is not. V is lucky that he is striving to change his situation because it makes him so uncomfortable, while he is still young. I allowed myself to enjoy my solitude for too long, until the point where most of my connections have died out from lack of attention and nurture. V had something to teach me too.
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