Social interaction is definitely not my forte and I have been told many times that I am down right rude. I had always thought of myself as polite – I thought that my mother had taught me well. She always said that her children were perfectly mannered and that she had been proud to take us out in public. Obviously my perception was and is flawed. I think people find me rude for two reasons. One, as a shy person, I’m not comfortable with strangers. I avoid big impersonal gatherings if possible because meeting new people has always set off a panic attack. If I have to go, I usually sit off to the side or wander around aimlessly for the required amount of time until I can politely exit. Second, I do not do the mindless prattle thing (small talk). If I have something to say to someone, I will say it. If I want to know something, I will ask. But there is no way I am going to go up to someone I don’t particularly like and ask them about their lives. I still do not understand how other people do it. I have watched two people whom I know dislike each other intensely chat away for hours. What’s the point? The minute they part – they turn around and stab each other in the back. I’m told that this is called diplomacy.
I was working in Vancouver and had to talk to Joyce the office manager about some travel arrangements. I called Joyce during a rehearsal break and gave her the details that she needed to finalize my ticket. The next day the director called me over. “You were extremely rude to Joyce yesterday and that’s not something that I appreciate.” All right – now I’m confused. I had no idea what I had said to Joyce that upset her. My friend Abby clarified the situation for me. It is polite to banter around some lighter conversation like inquiring about health and talking about the weather before you get down to business. I figured that I could do that – but not without some conscious effort. From that point on, I carried an egg timer with me. You know – one of those itty-bitty sand glasses. Every time that I had to call Joyce, I would turn over my egg timer and ask meaningless questions. “How are you?, Do you think it’ll rain today?” Not listening to the answers but staring at the egg timer and waiting. When the sand ran out, I would get back to business and tell Joyce the reason I had called. It worked. Never had another complaint.
As a dancer, I could avoid the diplomacy thing most of the time – because not a lot of people want to talk to the lowly dancers of a company. As the rehearsal director, I could get away with a minimal amount of contact with strangers – rehearsal directors are background people not overly interesting. As the director however – things changed. I had to talk to people. Theresa and I were attending a performance and during the intermission we ran into Jennifer, who is a curator for a dance performance series that I had wanted to be part of for a while. Jennifer always turned me down. Theresa greeted Jennifer who turned to me and asked me how I was. “Fine,” I said and continued walking through the lobby. Theresa followed me saying, “Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong!” “What?” I asked her. “You should have stayed and talked to Jennifer.” “About what?” I said throwing up my hands, “She doesn’t like me, I don’t like her. What could we possibly talk about?” She put her hands on her hips and glared at me. “You could have asked her what she was doing these days.” My face was blank. I was confused. “Theresa, I don’t even think of these things.” Theresa sighed, “You have to learn to do this for the good of the company.” She started bouncing with excitement, “I know! I’ll teach you what to say!” With that Theresa became my own personal “Professor Higgins”.
Theresa gave me a list of things to ask to get a conversation going. I studied the list diligently: “How are you?”, “What are you working on these days?”, “How are your kids?,” etc. I practiced on my dancers which amused them immensely. After all, this was not the straight talker that they had become accustomed to. Soon after the lessons began, a dancer I have never liked (and the feeling was mutual) came to the studio. She was renting my space for one of her rehearsals. Theresa poked me in the ribs. “Go on,” she hissed, “Do it!” I walked up to the woman and went through my routine: “How are you, what are you doing these days, How are your kids?” Do you know what happened? She hugged me. OK – now I’ve got a problem. If this woman thinks that I am her friend – I really have a problem. If everyone is hugging and flattering everyone else – how do you know who your true friends are? I liked my method much better – talk to the people that I am truly interested in, listen to the people that have something of value to say and be honest with the people that I care about. On the other hand – I have become more diplomatic. I can now maneuver my way through a room of hostiles without receiving or inflicting any visible damage. It does make life easier sometimes and Theresa really did teach me a valuable tool.