Encroaching on my solitude

Or on my time 🎧 listening to audiobooks and music. Both are very valuable to me: complete solitude and 🎧 time. I have a long list of titles I want to listen to and I have big projects that require solitude for contemplation.

Far from being an asocial person, I simply value time alone.

So there is this neighbor in our complex with whom I crossed paths during what used to be my morning walk routine two years ago. Later, she texted me to invite to a movie night out with her girlfriends and I declined. Then, last summer, she gave me a ride from the clinic after a medical procedure (the kind under sedation, so I was required to bring a responsible driver and disallowed shared rides).

I no longer go on morning walks..

Recently, my patio door was open and this neighbor walked in with her doggie. We had a pleasant conversation during which I mentioned starting to use the sauna in the conplex' clubhouse. I mentioned it because we talked about sleep apnea and other sleep difficulties.

I am always alone in the sauna and it is my audio time. I stay for 20 minutes. She expressed the intention to join me.

Again, I am not asocial and she is a perfectly pleasant neighbor, just not someone whom I would want to spend every evening with. So far, she has not texted and the few occasions I was at the sauna, I was still alone.

I would be perfectly happy to invite her to a long home cooked dinner or lunch as a one time thing or even once in a while. I can even see myself joining her for a movie, again one time or maybe two times separated by long stretches of not seeing her. What I do not see myself doing is swapping the audio time alone for small talk with her every single night. The sauna is a community amenity and of course I cannot restrict her access to it. I am thinking that if she starts going to the sauna at the same time with me, I will stop going and instead will go on evening walks outside of our complex. Luckily I do not have a set schedule with the sauna - sometimes I go earlier and other times, I go later. Without coordination, she cannot always be there together with me

I am not looking for new friendships of a deep kind. I prioritize keeping in touch with the many friends I already have (just a couple of them are local). In other words, I go for depth and tenure and not shallowness and newness.

I have been thinking about what to do if this neighbor texts me about the sauna. How to communicate what I have just written here without sounding impolite or unappreciative is what I have been contemplating. I realize that she may be at a different station in her life at which she is looking for new friends and doesn't have consuming personal projects that require solitude.

Ideas?

Tell her the sauna is your meditation time? Like you must be quiet to be able to concentrate on all your body parts as it is part - the 4th leg! - of the comprehensive physical journey / makeover you are on.

,I will just have to say it with a straight face.

Sometimes you just have to ask for what you need.

It helps to keep it simple:

"I'm sorry, but I go to the sauna to enjoy some time alone and meditate."

Would you be willing to go for an ocassional short walk with her around the community? Maybe that would satisfy her, and that way you could more easily control the duration and set some expectations?

You're not alone. I like to be social, but am also an introvert who needs downtime to recharge. A lot of people don't seem to be able to understand that. I've come to the conclusion that people like this are very externally oriented, so they think if others aren't outwardly doing something, then they're not doing anything at all, and must be available for socializing.

Yeah "the 4th leg" was perhaps a step too far!

Hence the trope:
Comics say funny things;
Comedians say things funny.

I’d tell her that you cannot commit to set time when you go to sauna because you go when your body feels that it needs it. Sometimes it’s 7pm and sometimes it’s 8am. It cannot be planned ahead. Tell her that you’d be happy to run into her there, but you cannot make any arrangements.

That is brilliant. I will do that

There is a new term for people like us - ambiverts.

This neighbor needs to get a life. She sounds bored and lonely. People like that can be overly intrusive and look to use you as a source of entertainment. Guard your boundaries. It's better to limit her access to you now, rather than after you get more friendly, when it will get tougher to deflect her. Her walking into your place with her dog was rude. She could have been testing your tolerance.

She reports dating a man, but definitely, most definitely sounds bored.
Thank you, Rose, for the warning about guarding my boundaries NOW.