If you have not had the opportunity to read the book Quiet by Susan Cain I recommend you buy or download it immediately from your favourite supplier. It details the workings of the introvert's mind and mien, explaining much if you have ever felt like the misfit in the gung-ho, team-oriented, rah-rah, let's-share-everything socialized world that we now inhabit.
My only criticism of Ms. Cain's work is that she was, generally, not able to delineate just how an introvert can better exist in the extrovert's world and, specifically, how in the world a peace-loving body such as myself can pleasantly tolerate an extrovert husband who will shortly drive me crazy. Or at least out of the house.
As I write this my husband, who is semi-retired, is home for the day. It is not yet 9.30 a.m. and he has had out the stepladder, flashlights and various tools. He has pulled out the entertainment unit, asked me where the batteries are and turned off the radio I was listening to. Then he turned it on at a very high volume and established that one speaker in the porch was definitely not working.
"Has this speaker not been working all summer?", he demanded.
"I'm not sure...I just really have it on in the background," I mumbled. I should have mentioned that I prefer the sounds of lapping water, loon calls, the neighbouring islands as they come to life in the early morning but, well, I am an introvert.
My morning began peacefully. Picture me at my cottage. The sun is shining through the screens in my porch. I have my coffee at my elbow and the crossword in my lap. CBC Radio is playing peacefully, at a low decibel level. Bliss reigns.
Then my husband, who has left an idyllic island to find a group of men and coffee on the mainland, returns. Within five minutes all is shattered. I flee the porch where there will shortly be power tools in action and cuss words in the once-peaceful air. In the end, as happens on most of his days off, he will have to go into the city for parts. All well and good--the leaving for the city part--but if only we could get directly from him returning to him leaving again. If only he could find (or manufacture) whatever critical problem is going to absorb him for the day the night before. How efficient to go to coffee and then to the city.
Wait, there's an update: "It's ugly. There's a broken wire somewhere." A longer ladder has arrived with more noise and commotion and swearing. Speakers have been swapped to no avail. And the TV unit sits mid-living room. He's now surfing the net for solutions, guy sites that offer strategies for dealing with life's mechanical conundrums and guy customer reviews. I expect a summary of The Situation shortly and the conclusion that parts will be needed. Good. "I knew that", I resist blurting.
I guess it's time to throw in the towel and find some gardening or some such to do outside.
