Social Skills

I enjoy small social gatherings with normally no more than six people at a time, which allows me to interact on a more personal level and getting to know the person better. However, attending any large gathering tends to turn me into a nervous wreck, and if the gathering smacks of anything formal, I become for the lack of a better description, a walking recipe for disaster.

Even though I would have read and re-read the invitation hundreds of time, I would panic  whether I have the dress code correctly, normally five minutes before arriving at the venue, driving anybody with me insane. I am also inherently shy, an introvert of nature, so being exposed to a group of people staring at me when I enter the room, immediately results in a blush that would put a sun ripened tomato to shame with the tips of my ears stinging all night long. My brain shuts down with no coherent thoughts present except for a fervently repeated prayer; “Please dear God, do not let me trip”.

I become tongue-tied, battling to even find the proper response to a “Good evening”. My hearing diminished to the point, where I will be staring at a person, in total panic, wondering frantically what to say, because I would have no idea what he just said. And forget about me remembering any names, even if name tags larger than life is being displayed on every chest passing me by...unfortunately, the loss of cognitive processes, hearing, speech and sight abilities seems to be all interlinked.

I tend to find a corner, the only time I might add, willingly, trying to make myself inconspicuous and feverishly hoping that no one will attempt to talk to me about weather, sport or the latest social scandal in the news. The weather is beyond my control, and responses to it are no more than two sentences. I do not know anything about sport, and really could not be bothered with who is making the back pages of newspapers.

I stay away from the food table in principle, depending on whoever is with me, to supply me with a plate of snacks. I have dropped far too many spoons into dips, forks onto the floor, and the total destruction of a fruit display was sort of the last straw in my attempt to obtain my own food. I make sure that the waiters approach me from the front as there is nothing as embarrassing as sending a full of champagne glasses across the room, earning more stares, mostly disapproving, trying to determine if I might have been at the bottles behind the bar.

In all honesty, I do try to avoid these functions, but due to work, there are times where I do not have much of an option. However, not all hope is lost, as I might have found a solution, to improve my general social skills quite considerably, without leaving chaos in my wake....