Non People Person

June 30, 2018

I am not a people person, and it’s OK. Those words sound like the opening statement of an AA meeting. To be truthful, it has taken me years to get to the place where I can say that, and even now, it feels uncomfortable. Today began at 4:00 am so I could get to the church by 5:30 to help prepare breakfast for the cyclists who camped out in the building for the night on their way from South Bend, Indiana to Niagara Falls. Between the cyclists and our church people who served them so kindly, it was filled with people. I was home again by 9:30, but was pretty beat. A short nap before fixing the garage door, then on to two graduation parties and a short errand with Linda.

At the second party, I watched a friend as he talked and laughed with this one and that one, greeting people right and left. I sat at a table fascinated with the ease with which he he moved from person to person. Years ago, it was drilled into me that this was the kind of thing pastors are regularly and consistently supposed to do. I’ve done my share of it, but it is never easy, and when I watch others, I must confess that the guilt starts to rise up in me. Some of it is that with my hearing difficulties, I can’t follow conversations in crowds. The other part is that I’d just rather be home. So here I am (finally!).

Tomorrow will be filled with people again, and I am glad for it. They keep me from retreating into a tiny, self-contained world. Those little worlds may be comfortable, but they do not feed the soul. Even this non-people person needs others to keep me from shriveling into a shadow of what I was meant to be, and I am thankful tonight for each of them who stretch me just by their presence, pushing me to be more than just myself. It’s not comfortable, but it is good and necessary, and I am grateful for them tonight. No, I am not a people person, and it’s OK. But it’s not OK to let that self-revelation control me and my interactions with others.