I am not someone who enjoys company, and oftentimes when interacting with others in person, most of my interest and energy is spent on observing the other person and robotically responding to their words. At my default, I present a timid yet enthusiastic persona to general strangers so as to leave a harmonious memory for the other party; when conversing with peers of similar status and age, my default is concise and awkward to, on one hand, discourage conversation, and on the other, satisfy the other party’s need to feel at ease or even superior, for lack of a better word; when conversing with someone I am expected to see often or a person with a higher status/prestige, I present a more genial and attentive persona to, once more, suit the other party’s expectations of my inferior presence and also to create a foundation for our interactions in the future, meaning asking many questions and showing interest in a particular area or hobby.
Even if I present these defaults, if the interaction goes on for longer than I anticipated, then I would, of course, cater to the situation and generally hold more attention to the other party’s concerns at the moment. Whether the person who interacts with me is a talker or not, I am often able to pick up in patterns or general trends based on age, presented gender, and power according to the setting. I’ll think about these patterns with you today.
Age has perhaps the biggest indicator of how a conversation flows and what to expect from the other party. To start off, I’ll mention my conversations with children, specifically of the ages below an adolescent’s hips (because that is how I gauge children — I’m not very good).
Children have much to say but have a limited vocabulary and knowledge of language to communicate it. Because of this, I often have conversations with children who repeat phrases/similar clauses to achieve different meanings and sentiments. They’ll exaggerate with the repetition of descriptive words so as to give an accurate retelling of their impression of the subject. Their biggest concern, when communicating, is being misunderstood, and one can often tell if this fear is usually present by their behavior towards more intimate persons.
For example, I once had a conversation with a child who was very curious about the world but suppressed it for a greater fear and anticipation of being misunderstood. I could tell, not because of his way of speech, but because of his behavior towards and in response to the authority figure who was also in vicinity of our conversation — his mother.
After some time, he got a bit more relaxed and became more open (his mother was engaged in conversation with someone else at this exact time). His movements became grander and he spoke with more passion, but his face was dull and focused solely on myself. In his excitement, he related the topic that we were talking about to his mother, who immediately turned around and yelled, “what are you saying about me?”
His consequent actions showed a bit of their dynamic at home. He immediately stopped swinging his arms and stood as upright as a pencil, closed his mouth shut, and stared widely at his mother. I quickly explained that we were just talking about roads and how he thought that she probably knew more about them than the both of us combined, and she calmed down and resumed talking with the other person after a few scrutinizing words towards her son. Throughout all this, the boy was still and silent, and only resumed talking hesitantly after a few encouraging words from myself.
It was quite a large family based on who was there at the time: there were two younger brothers who were also looking about, but no one besides the boy I was talking to attempted to make eye contact with myself (the mother seemed rather tired and focused on her conversation partner instead). This seems to prove the impact of a family dynamic more than age, but I’ll use another example to explain what I’m getting at.
In another instance, I was “talking” with a little girl. I put “talking” in quotation marks because her parents — a mother and a father — were also engaged and encouraging her to speak while also speaking of anecdotes from their domestic life. Throughout the conversation, she was shy and coy, smiling and nodding to what her parents had to say about herself. She expressed interest in the objects that were directly around us and just as easily lost interest as soon as her parents told her what they were. This is not to say that she was bored, but rather, that she had full trust in what her parents had to say and didn’t feel it necessary to continue the subject.
In comparison to the previous example, would you say that this girl was in a more fulfilled state than the boy? I suppose that generally, the behavior of the girl is more positively accepted (for there is not as much to say about my conversation with the girl as there was with the boy), but what I am getting at is neither a positive nor a negative observation.
What I concluded after several similar instances with children is that they are truly moldable little people who are what they eat. They need more information about the world in order to be able to fully express themselves, but in order to get the information, they must also be willing to communicate, which is their greatest hurdle. The fear of being misunderstood can be seen in both these examples: for the boy, it was an obvious danger to be misunderstood, and for the girl, it was the deliberate catering to the parents so that more information could be obtained. After all, bare agreement is rarely an indicator of opinion, it is more of a tactic to preserve harmony and continue operations. Thoughts rarely align, and it is more likely that the girl did not have any other words to describe herself other than the few that her parents were giving her. Verbal reinforcement and such.
Do not misconstrue my thoughts and think that I am saying that both instances exemplified abusive familial relationships or negative actions towards children: I do not know either of these families and have shared only my opinion after reflecting on these two particular interactions. Ah, thinking of it, I also have an experience with a family member that I wish to recount, although I do not know how it would contribute to this conversation just yet.
I’ll mention my interactions with my niece, who is probably 2 years old and someone I rarely see. Recently, her family was hosting a birthday party and invited family and friends to bring their children to play. I’ll preface this by saying that everyone had an inflated, positive impression of my niece, and basically everyone — child and adult — wanted to interact with her on that day. Curry favor, I suppose, even for the children (who were older than her by a few years, mind you).
Conversations with my niece are very blunt and fun. That is because she cannot speak in complete words, much less full sentences. I happen to dislike speaking and also take to grunts and babble with her — probably a harmful perpetuation of her current speaking abilities, but I don’t see her for the majority of the year, and I assume that her military parents have got that sort of education covered. The result is a harmonious, relatively quiet atmosphere with some squeals of excitement sprinkled in, as well as some common words to express more direction/indication.
This communication style is unique to myself and her, and shows great contrast when interacting with others. Sometimes, because of how she acts accommodatingly towards elders and peers, I wonder if she first took pity on me, who was quiet and alone for the majority of the day, and took it as her mission to “cheer me up”, but I hadn’t observed her enough to conclude whether that was the case or not. I was overwhelmed at the party, after all, and spent half of it alone in a separate room so that I would have the energy to go home with a pleasant attitude (woe is me /s). Anyways, what is more interesting is her communication style/responses to others who fawn over her.
Fawn isn’t really a good term to use, though from the outside it sure looks like it. Elders who approach her usually squeal and call her cute, badgering others to take a photo for themselves. Yes, it is the elders, people above the age of 50, who insist on taking a photo with her or else capture her every movement on a phone. You’d think it would be the young adult group who would do this for their socials, but in my family, it seems that the elders are more obsessed with this function, and for good reason (as one ages, it becomes more and more difficult to see others in person given the nature of modern life; the younger people can basically come and go as they will).
Much of my impression of these interactions are heavily tainted by my biases. It’s so tedious everytime a new aunt rushes up and hugs my niece, yelling “picture, picture”, and telling others to call my niece’s name so that she would look at the camera. My niece, for her part, seems to be very used to this and can take it all without a tantrum, knowing that as soon as she cries, she will be surrounded by a crowd of people more than tripled her height who will shush her and baby her to her heart’s content (of which is also very tedious, but useful). She will cooperate under the understanding that as soon as the picture is taken, she will be left alone to play and do her own thing (very literally so, it is so strange to see the elders immediately stop their badgering just to croon over a photo even though the real thing is here and she wants to play with blocks).
Once again, it is compliance for the sake of harmony, compliance due to repeated exposure and acceptance.
The children of that party were similar, if only a little more restrained due to the uncertainties of childhood. They would badger her about her interests, asking, “do you like this? Do you like that?”, and then telling others that one object was her favorite, when in fact, my niece just likes whatever is handed to her (a sensible child indeed). It is the reactions of others that prompts her behavior, and so when met with myself, who is incapable of giving a reaction, she is very content to introduce me to all sorts of toys and trinkets in her house (she has many nice toys).
I have not much else to say after this. Oh, well, I do have some other anecdotes on conversations with peers and people who are my elders, but I find that this chapter is already quite long, and it would be more sustainable for me to continue this conversation another time. You see, I am busy today with editing the prologues of my works that are not to be uploaded until the site reaches certain milestones — look forward to that.
Not only age, but also gender and preconceived power has a role to play when I find myself conversing with others. I’m sure that you recognize these instances as well, but I’ll be sharing my experiences another time.
