I like being introverted. It makes life simpler in my opinion. I have to engage as I belong to a couple of volunteer groups, but this is in small pieces, and I can go home and recharge in my backyard oasis. I limit what I do, and it works. A big thing to me is to finally not care what others think, a freeing moment.

I've always been socially insecure and reclusive. But, covid-19 showed me there's a limit. I like having people around as long as I don't need to talk to them.

I also have social anxiety, I hate all social situations.

Over the past thirty years Kate and I have not had many friendships, we ha e had two people to our home in the past twenty years. I like being around people, but I do not like to converse with people who cannot share a conversation. I have no time to just sit and listen to drivel. But there are times when the situation just hits on as funny and laughter exudes. Kate cannot get out and so we spend a lot of time watching TV while we are doing other things. Kate is hard of hearing so I have to repeat some of the good lines, we laugh a lot.

At this point in my life, I'm so accustomed to not going places that make forced interactions necessary that I don't think of it until someone close to me requires it. My extrovert BFF will be getting married this year and I'm not looking forward to expending the energy required to participate in all of those activities. I may wish, in the abstract, that I was more extroverted because so much of the world is geared to them, but I find introverts tend to develop more intimate relationships with their small group of friends, and I like that better.

They told me during the pandemic to keep a social distance of 6 feet, and I asked what was wrong with my traditional anti-social distance of 50+ feet.