[lenjan]

Despite what I do for a living, I am actually a fairly shy person. Add to it that depression makes you naturally just want to curl up and hide, and you get someone who is just not that great at being social.

Tonight was the office Christmas party at the big boss's house. I needed a night out, and I thought it would be a good way to get to know some of my coworkers. Mercifully, enough of them were kind enough to me that I didn't spend more than a couple of minutes sitting there staring into space with nothing to do and no one to talk to, but that's usually how I am at parties.

I don't work in the main office. Some of these people I met for approximately 1.25 seconds my first day on the job, which is about as high-stress as you can get, and being that I wasn't going to be in the same newsroom with them, I just kind of smiled and nodded and got shepherded to the next desk over. Some of them I can honestly say I have never seen before in my life. Yet every single person who came in and saw me, PLUS their SO's, greeted me by name and asked a question indicating that they knew at least a little about me (or could at least pretend to be interested, but that's kind of an occupational skill).

It made for kind of an uneasy night. I can BS with the best of 'em, but it was very disconcerting to be having to do so. I eventually was able to put bylines to faces just by listening carefully to their conversations with others, and for some reason the spouses mostly took pity on me -- though I had a lengthy chat with the food editor, coincidentally one of the people I had never seen before -- but it was just a weird night.

So I need somebody who has better social skills than I do to tell me how to maneuver one of these outings the next time it happens. Since I've only lived in this town 6 weeks, it's going to happen a lot yet.

Thanks

Candy

[SeptemberMorn]

Candy, if it had been me, I would have considered the evening a success. If I had been there, I would have been the one sitting in a corner all by myself and no one would have spoken to me.

[phillygirl]

You are so far ahead of me! I have a terrible time remembering names too. I'm really impressed that you can smalltalk with folks and do ok. I think your night was a success too I'm so bad at small talk, what did you chat about?

[lenjan]

Since I'm the new kid, and moved here from another town, mostly it was a combination of shop talk (unavoidable even at a Christmas party, it seems) and "how do you like it"/"how does this compare to (your old town) (your old paper)"/ blah blah blah sort of deal. I mean, it was nice to get to know people, but just unnerving to have all these people know me when I'd never met them (in some cases)!

The secret to small talk is finding something to comment on that will get the other person talking, so you don't have to. At least that's how I like to do it! I mean, if you greet someone with "oh, what a beautiful sweater," it launches a conversation about where she bought it, or who made it for her, and then you can just kind of follow the thread from there. Pretty soon you have either a list of good stores in the area or a chat about knitting, which leads into "do you do any crafts?", etc etc ad infinitum.

[Perna]

I think since you're "new" you get a grace period of a couple parties :-) I always use to dread going to my husband's office parties but eventually I got to know one or two people well enough so I could hang out with them each year. My own office parties I was in the central office so did know more people but when I was new, I felt awkward because I didn't know many, especially from the other offices, and I felt I "should" of since I was in accounting and did payroll, etc. Most people grouped together by their group and I got so each Christmas party I visited the different tables for a moment or two and greeted those I knew and "accepted" greetings from those I didn't (returning the greeting) and it worked out okay.

I think just giving a bit of attention, "showing up" in a sense, is all people have time for so don't think a person rude or avoiding them if they make that momentary connection and say, "Hi." If it's not people you work directly with, I treat them kind of like I do nice store clerks :-) and am friendly but talk about "common" things rather than ask about their lives/children, etc. I think it sounds like you did marvelously.

Oh, one of my first summer picnics with my husband's office, I'd had medical problems which people knew and asked how I was, etc. even though they didn't know me well -- I think lots of comments by people we don't know are just hand-me-down information/inquiries to be "nice" but don't require in-depth responses. The other people have the advantage of knowing more about us than we do about them but I don't think they expect we then learn "comparable" amount about them, just taking the time to answer any questions they have is fine? Sometimes there are little "shorthand" meetings/greetings you can remember from year to year; one woman where my husband worked had kids reading Harry Potter when I was reading Harry Potter and so Harry Potter became a topic of conversation the next time we saw each other nearly a year later :-)