Don't talk to me

I was raised in a family of yellers. When it came to disagreements, the most hostile move was silence. At least shouting is a form of engagement. When you're already insecure about being taken seriously, nothing is worse than the silent treatment. I thought everyone felt this way and it took me years to learn otherwise, to realise that a refusal to talk could be something other than a power play. Instead of recognising in it an attempt to defuse a volatile situation, I paradoxically saw it as an escalation and responded in kind.

Once Nuphy and I went out to eat at our favourite Thai restaurant with several of our friends. While I was engrossed in conversation, he surreptitiously picked all the meat out of my entree. I was appalled to discover this and screamed, "Why did you do that?" My annoyance vanished almost as soon as I expressed it, but he was so hurt and humiliated he didn't say a word to me on the walk home. By the time we got there, I was so furious with him that I ultimately ended up sleeping over at e.'s that night.

Another result of this is that I thought that ignoring someone I was really upset with was "sending them a message". Again, it took me years to realise my mistake, that there are so many reasons for interruptions in communication in relationships that normal people find no reason to assume that an apparent break is deliberate. In the meantime, it added to my insecurities, as I found it hard to tell when someone was just bad about getting back to people and when I was getting the cold shoulder.

All of this informed my reaction when, a year and a half ago, Tuppers suddenly broke off all communication with us. One week, we were taking him out for his birthday in an intimate group, the next he wouldn't answer a single text, let alone pick up the phone. To this day, I have no idea why, and I know better than to try and ask. I've been through this enough times now to recognise classic narcissistic behaviour when I see it; thanks to Despina, I even have a proven model for coping with it.

Basically, I have to keep my expectations minimal, and part of that means waiting to be contacted. So when I say "I'll be damned if I'm the first to get in touch", it's an assertion of what I choose to do to protect my own ego, a reminder that an isolated act of generosity is no indication of any sort of commitment to be thoughtful and responsive. But I phrase it the way I do because of that lingering misconception that whoever breaks the silence first is the "weaker" party, has lost this particular round in the struggle not to be made a fool of.

I'm not necessarily like that with others. Although I can't quite shake the suspicion that there's something behind the ongoing drought of invitations from spookyfruit and welcomerain, I have enough trust in them as sensible straight-talking human beings not to pussyfoot around it, and so I have no qualms about calling them up when the urge strikes. Same goes for most friends of longstanding; we drift in and drift out, and the silence in between is comfortable, just as it would be in each other's presence.