I learned a new lesson today.
Even on message boards, I don’t talk enough and I’m still too negative.
I am not one to spend a lot of time with people, in real life or online, who are not in my family nucleus. In an effort to better understand myself, I took a personality test and found a forum that had people similar to me in their thinking.
“Great!” I think to myself. “Finally, people who understand that I don’t always have fully prepared thesis for every comment that gets made.”
I was wrong.
It makes me sad though, that even in a community of people who are different, I still managed to piss off someone because I didn’t meet their expectations of me. I didn’t engage in the conversation enough or profess enough gratitude for their response to my question.
I know I shouldn’t let someone I don’t know, who doesn’t know me, who lives halfway across the world from me, dictate my feelings. It bothers me that I feel it necessary now to start each of my comments with a disclaimer:
<—- this poster may not engage in conversation. She may read your comments and post nothing. Or she may read your comments, think they are awesome and post a one line reply, usually ill-attempted and nowhere near conveying the proper response you may or may not require. She has a dark & dry sense of humor. Any and/or all comments may be ill suited to your expectations. However, that doesn’t mean your comment did not provoke thought or a warm feeling of fuzziness, though her response may not (probably won’t) evoke both responses in you.
Maybe I truly don’t know how to interact with people on any level?
Or maybe I don’t take things as seriously as I should?
Maybe I’m taking this message board thing too seriously?
I’m going to do my laundry and wait for the snow to melt. Read a book. Cook my dinner. All things I know I can do without hurting someone’s feelings. I’m beginning to understand why some people leave society and are never heard from again.
Still sad, though. Sorry (you know who you are).
