Sitting down with friends, I hear them classify people. This person is a hipster. This person is an athlete. This person is a gamer. They talk about how they were excluded in high school or they butt heads with the others. They talk about how Longwood is like a high school: being on the small side of universities with similar people sitting together in the dining hall. All the while, I’m shaking my head. I’ve never fit into cliques at any point in life; I’ve tried to know a little about what everyone likes and really, I think dressing like another person is silly.
But being like other people in some way isn’t the issue. The issue is that we self-segregate. We’re afraid to talk to different people or build up a secret hatred based on judgments from afar. They’re a jerk; they’re creepy; they’re awkward; they’re obnoxious. So we limit ourselves to, at best, a couple dozen people and stop talking to everyone else after the first year.
Sometimes, it’s simply that we fall into a habit. Sometimes we don’t mean to exclude people from our lives. We get involved with an organization; we move from one dorm to another. There are even times that you simply don’t run into people again. Those sorts of things happen.
But there are reasons to stay connected with the people you knew before. There are reasons you should get to know people that scare you or confuse you or are just different from you. The fact of the matter is that you will have to deal with someone different from you every day of your adult life. They may be teammates, employees or bosses. You can’t just avoid them entirely. You’re going to need them to help you, and you’re going to have to get over yourself.
Looking across the row at some other person laughing, talking or doing something in a way that you wouldn’t is also only the tip of the iceberg. Yes, other human beings have as complex and important a history as you do. I was talking with my friend, a guy who used to go to Longwood. His brother is severely autistic and can hardly use the bathroom by himself. He’s got Asperger’s Syndrome and most people can pick it up by the difference in his voice, in his timing and his movements. Human beings are sensitive little tickers for differences, and they come down hard on him. People don’t always understand why he acts differently from them and they sometimes feel threatened.
I remember being at an organization meeting once where this boy was discussed. He had come to a couple of the meetings previously, and the leader of the group had to explain his condition to the rest of the group, giving suggestions on how to deal with it. It made me a little sick. Of course she was telling us to be tolerant and nice and that we didn’t have to talk to him if we didn’t feel like it. Knowing him, the reason was apparent. He wears clothes that other people wouldn’t put together. He’s over six feet tall and heavy; he gets too close sometimes. But I wondered why we needed a group response to a harmless person. Talking to him again during a visit, he told me about a teacher he used to have that tried to convince him to be like the other children. He described people like that as opinionated. I described them as wrong.
Some people might say that it’s natural for humans to be afraid of what’s different. I’m forever questioning what is natural. Really, we don’t do anything by pushing people away except cause hurt. This is not to say that there are not people that you should push away, relationships that you should end. But a person who is no position to do harm, who’s never hurt you, shouldn’t be avoided simply because you don’t have a word for them. In the end, what are you but another bigot?
I think my life has benefitted from a wide group of friends, from my fraternity brothers to one of my oldest girl buddies that I jokingly call my mom. They add variety, they help me learn, they teach me what to avoid and they join in on my inappropriate jokes. The spice of life is diversity, whether it’s my jazz fans, my metal fans or my country lovers. They help me grow into things I never thought I’d love.
So I don’t self-segregate. I don’t think people are too weird to talk to. Some folks might say the same thing of me: easy-going, dispassionate and intellectual. As I walk around smoking my pipe, maybe there are some people that would rather avoid me. I wouldn’t avoid them, especially walking around with my six-foot-three Mohawk- ed broseph or my longhaired anarchist roomie.
