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the burden of speach
Jun. 25th, 2014 05:36 pmI have had the following irksome experience a few times now, mostly at the memorial service (which is to be expected), but also at other large parties:
Some acquaintance, not well-connected socially-- a socially awkward person-- approaches me and says "Alex, I am so, so sorry." And looks at me with eyes filled with sorrow. Sometimes they go on to try to talk about some aspect of how tragic it all is. Then (as is typical in human interaction) they expect some response in return that is somehow relevant to what they said and the feeling that they are expressing.
And I'm like-- what now? How am I supposed to react to this? What am I supposed to say? Not "yeah, thanks, probate sucks and cleaning out a house after a hoarder dies sucks"; because, I think, they are mourning Rich, not my suffering per se. Not that I haven't but... from my perspective, the person I knew disappeared about 3 years ago, so I am in a quite different place about all this. Also, I have had weeks to process.
Your sorrow is intrusive if it comes out and wants to hang out together with my sorrow. My sorrow can't even begin to explain where its head is at to your sorrow, and therefore wants your sorrow to STFU and go away. (N.B.: I don't mean "you" literally here. People who read my LJ are clueful enough about my life to not do this.) This is actually the current #1 thing giving me pause about going to Baitcon...
If we were any other species of ape, we would sympathize by grooming each other's fur, which would be far preferable. Normally I'd rather have language than fur, but not in this case. Actually, I'd rank a massage as the #1 thing I would prefer. Still haven't had the Round Tuits to arrange a massage; back worse than ever, grr.
Some acquaintance, not well-connected socially-- a socially awkward person-- approaches me and says "Alex, I am so, so sorry." And looks at me with eyes filled with sorrow. Sometimes they go on to try to talk about some aspect of how tragic it all is. Then (as is typical in human interaction) they expect some response in return that is somehow relevant to what they said and the feeling that they are expressing.
And I'm like-- what now? How am I supposed to react to this? What am I supposed to say? Not "yeah, thanks, probate sucks and cleaning out a house after a hoarder dies sucks"; because, I think, they are mourning Rich, not my suffering per se. Not that I haven't but... from my perspective, the person I knew disappeared about 3 years ago, so I am in a quite different place about all this. Also, I have had weeks to process.
Your sorrow is intrusive if it comes out and wants to hang out together with my sorrow. My sorrow can't even begin to explain where its head is at to your sorrow, and therefore wants your sorrow to STFU and go away. (N.B.: I don't mean "you" literally here. People who read my LJ are clueful enough about my life to not do this.) This is actually the current #1 thing giving me pause about going to Baitcon...
If we were any other species of ape, we would sympathize by grooming each other's fur, which would be far preferable. Normally I'd rather have language than fur, but not in this case. Actually, I'd rank a massage as the #1 thing I would prefer. Still haven't had the Round Tuits to arrange a massage; back worse than ever, grr.
