The quiet one
I wrote recently about dinner party that my wife and I hosted last month, and about how well it went. Well, last weekend the six of us present that night had dinner together again, with another of the couples acting as hosts.
The evening didn’t go so well for me this time. It wasn’t that I was too quiet, or that I felt too overloaded – I coped with both of those things reasonably well. The problem this time was that some of the topics of conversation hit home just how much of an outsider I am. The other guests, of course didn’t know or even notice this.
The big thing that the six of us have in common, and ultimately the reason we became friends is that we each have a son who started at the same local school in January this year. We’ve known one of the couples since before our son was born – they went to the same parenting class as us. We’ve not known the other couple as long socially, although our son went to the same nursery as theirs. The mothers in the other two couples are both teachers of kids their own age, but at different schools. Much of our conversation over the evening flowed around school annoyances, and in particular the social etiquette of parents at the school gates.
At the core of these discussions were how some parents were rude and cliquey. Our sons are in a class of nearly thirty, so on a typical morning, once you’ve discounted the kids that arrive with one of a couple of childminders, there are over twenty parents dropping their children off for my son’s class. Some, of course are friendly. Others, it would seem, aren’t. The five other adults at the table that evening had all been variously blanked, ignored, or cut short by some of the other parents in the school yard. There was a lot made of how incredibly rude this was, and much musing as to why various sets of parents would talk to each other but blank parents of other children in the same year.
This all went very much over my head, with a bit of a feeling of horror. I take my son to school once or twice a week on average, depending on my shift pattern. After nearly six months of this, I recognise only a handful of the parents. Many are still unfamiliar faces to me. I’ve never been blanked nor cut short by anyone – but then again I’ve never made the effort to approach parents that I don’t know and introduce myself. As for who is the parent of which child – well I haven’t got a clue, and nor do I know what the children or parents are called. It became very clear to me over dinner that my normal mode of operation in this sort of scenario was very out of the ordinary. I felt quite ashamed and embarrassed. I’m well aware these days that I’m a little different from the norm, but I’m not used to having it pointed out (albeit inadvertently) just how unusual and unsophisticated my interaction with other people is.
I felt awful during dinner, but I didn’t let it show. It felt like I was one of these parents who my friends (ok, not sure of the best word here – friends are a tricky concept for me) were laying into. I was being overly hard on myself, of course.
Whilst I don’t talk to the other parents in the school yard much, I will say hello back to folks, and even engage in a little small talk, as long as the other person is doing the hard work of thinking up the direction of the conversation. But this is always with people I know already – the adults from the dinner party, and a couple of others who I know because my son went to Nursery with their child too. I’m not being cliquey or rude. I’m just finding the social etiquette of the school parent role difficult to master. The odd thing, from my perspective is that until that evening, I didn’t think I was finding it difficult to master. I was just doing what I always do in this sort of situation. I thought I was doing fine.
I am doing fine. I’m doing as well as I can hope to do at the moment. I’m just different from the norm.
Of course what this thread of conversation also showed is just how well I do hide my AS. Not once was there any suggestion from any of the gang that I might fall into the camp of those who don’t communicate with them. But these people already know me, and will happily start and perpetuate small talk with me at the school gates. This of course means that they don’t see how I go out of my way to avoid talking to the other people, to those I don’t know.
But maybe those who I don’t know think I’m rude because I don’t talk to them.
I’m not. I’m just coping the best I can.
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5 Responses to “The quiet one”
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Rachel on June 15th, 2009 Rachel(Quote)
James, this is so interesting. I often find myself in exactly the opposite position from you at the dinner party. In any group of two or more people, I am nearly always the *only* person who complains about people giving me cold stares, ignoring me, failing to respond to a greeting, or cutting me off in the middle of a sentence.
And I’m also the only one who thinks it’s rude. Everyone else just says, “Well, you know how people are…” Not a convincing response–at least, not to this Aspie.
I wonder whether NTs in the UK are just more attuned to the small courtesies. Here in the US, people really expect very little of one another as far as civility is concerned.
I highly doubt that anyone sees you as rude, James. Like you, I am friendly with people with whom I feel safe, and I keep a low profile with everyone else, but no one considers me rude. Except for my friends, most people don’t consider me at all. That used to upset me until I realized that I really did want to be left to myself most of the time anyway.
James on June 15th, 2009 James(Quote)
Rachel,
I think it’s a sort of liberal middle-class British snobbery that leads to us complaining about lack of courtesy in others.
Outside of this band of people, I suspect that Brits are just as silent about it, and expect just as little as Americans do.
I liked your sentence about keeping a low profile with everyone else. That’s exactly what I do, and I’ve done it for as long as I can remember. It’s one of my natural defence mechanisms.
Soph on June 26th, 2009 Soph(Quote)
I think as someone who only shows up at the school gates every so often, your behaviour is perfectly normal. You can’t be expected to be worrying about cliques in a place that you have very little contact with.
And I think as well, you have a kind of freedom. People who worry about cliques (and I’ve known people on the autism spectrum who worry about them a lot), achieve nothing except their own unhappiness.
I don’t think cliques really exist in the way we think they do. They are merely groups of people who are so happy in each other’s company that they get lazy about welcoming strangers. People who blank each other are usually does distracted or shy or possibly have their own communication issue, such as deafness.
James on June 26th, 2009 James(Quote)
Hi Soph,
Great to hear from you again! I hope you are well.
You are right that I shouldn’t worry, but I do.
I’ve just read a great piece by Gavin Bollard that explains it from another angle quite brilliantly: The Antisocial Parent. The part where Gavin talks about his son missing out on things due to him not being social with the other parents at soccer practice particularly hits home with me.
It’s difficult for me to really comment on your perception of whether cliques really exist, because I don’t really see them. My wife, and our friends certainly seem to, though.
Soph on July 3rd, 2009 Soph(Quote)
Hi James,
I can see where you’re coming from about the soccer practice thing.
I disappeared from the blogosphere because I was dealing with some issues that came about because I had a rather isolated upbringing. My parents tended not to socialise so as a child I missed seeing a lot of social interactions that I could have learnt from. Now I see families who do socialise a lot, and I feel a little jealous.
I would say, don’t worry too much. As long as your kids see you relating to other people, that should do the trick. You can find friends who will benefit from your way of looking at the world. For example, deaf people understand communication issues. As do people with learning difficulties.