THE ONE WHO DIDN’T HAVE A THING
By: Adora Neboh
Tags: Passion, Interests, Human Behavior, Missed Connections, Friendship

THE ONE WHO DIDN’T HAVE A THING

In our first interaction she came across as someone who cared. Cared about her health and seemed mindful of the environment. She was also about my age, and I figured we’d both seen a bit of life and would be able to engage with each other in that knowing way only life experiences can bring about.

Excitedly, I decided to see her again. We met for dinner. It started pretty well, she brought me gifts; naturally scented incense sticks and a soy wax lavender candle. Once again I was made aware of my awkward social skills because it never crossed my mind to bring her anything. Immediately she went up 2 notches in my estimation. “What a beautiful heart!” I thought. It also didn’t hurt that she was stunningly beautiful in my eyes. Her dark skin nearly luminous in contrast at the places where it caught the light; clean-shaven head and the suggestion of slightly flared hips shockingly close to the image of what I always imagined I would look like if I had crafted myself.

Of course I wanted to get to know her better, my infinite fascination with human behavior violently stoked. I’m the kind of person that needs context to connect with people. It’s not enough to know where you work or how old you are. I want to know what drives you, what hurts you, what motivates you and how it influences your actions. I want you stark naked on my dissecting table. I want to see the hidden corners, the dark places. I guess I can be a little intense when I’m interested. Thankfully, it’s pretty exhausting to engage with many people in this way so I limit the full blast of my curiosity to the few people who grip my interest enough to want to explore, while saving other people the headache of having to deal with me, I suppose.

So I dived in, like a child with a box of chocolates. I wanted to unwrap every piece. What would I find? Bits of hazelnut? Gooey centers? White chocolatey bits? Ooohhh.

Gradually, as the conversation went on, I realized I couldn’t quite put my finger on what her passions were. So I had to ask pointedly; “Like, what exactly do you enjoy? Want to do? Want to be?”

“I don’t know” she said. With a nonchalant shrug of her pretty shoulders.

“Huh?!” I must’ve said. Then I collected myself “I mean what’s your thing?”

“I don’t have a thing” she said

I was totally nonplussed at this point and I found judgment creeping into my thoughts. I took a deep breath and reminded myself I didn’t know everything and this was how you learnt new things, by opening your mind to ideas outside of your frame of reference. Okay, good. Let’s learn.

“So… you don’t have a thing? Is this a temporary situation? Are you trying to find your thing? Did you ever have a thing?”

“Not really” she replied; another nonchalant shrug of those shoulders.

“Isn’t that…like drifting?” I pressed on “I mean what’s life about if you don’t have a thing that centers you? I’m not saying it has to be anything that’s defined by societal expectations, but something that’s yours…”

“What’s wrong with drifting?” She cut me off. “I don’t have a thing and I may never have a thing, we all shouldn’t have a thing. I don’t know what I’m good at and I’m not searching for it”

Something in me recoiled so hard, and as you may imagine, the rest of the date was pretty lackluster. I had nothing to explore. How do you converse with someone who isn’t passionate about anything?

After this meeting, I made no attempt to contact her again. Not surprisingly, neither did she try to contact me. Yes, it was that bad.

“What kind of life is that? What’s life about if we aren’t students of this space we inhabit, students of our existence of our environment, of self? If we don’t recognize the value and depth the actual desire to participate in our own existence adds to our lives then why exist?” I thought irritably.

You see, because I’m an introvert who craves meaningful connections in small doses; it’s hard to lose the few friendships I’m able to cultivate. So I agonized about this meeting for a while. Was I simply judgmental? Did her lack of passion for anything mean she wasn’t still a potentially meaningful connection? Do I have an odious, self righteous, hypocritical streak I need to fix? Why did I automatically disqualify her? (I guess she disqualified me too) lol.

I employ a certain metaphor to describe how I connect with people. I’m like an extension cable with several sockets. Each socket representing a dimension of my personality/intellect/needs/ whatever. I tend to pursue meaningful connections with people who plug deeply and firmly into one or more of my sockets. Maybe my “soul mate” is the one who plugs into the most number of sockets.

Therefore, one thought settled the matter for me. It’s really not my place to tell anyone what to do with their own existence, but it doesn’t mean I need to be friends with them if they don’t stimulate me in the ways I need to be stimulated. I need to be able to find a point or several points of connection with them. You’ve got to plug into my sockets!