Hey folks,
I figured it was finally time to crawl out of the cave I've been living in all weekend and write the next installment to my blog. Truth be told I haven't actually moved into a cave, it is a term I prefer to use in describing my retreats into isolation and solitude after taking in too much of the world. I take these retreats often, and can go for days without actually speaking to anyone. Granted it is much easier not to talk to anyone if there is a language barrier, but it also helps that I am an introvert.
Right now many of you may be saying, "ohhhh, I wonder if he has enough friends?" Or, "Why is he such a loner?" After all, who in their right mind can really go for days without speaking to anyone? This must imply that poor lonely individual has no one to speak to. Well, more often than not that individual isn't lonely, has plenty of friends, and really enjoys their solitude. I am one of those.
For me, a quiet weekend relaxing, reading, running, exploring, and cooking, is much less stressful and less mentally taxing than attending parties or large social gatherings. In fact I often dread such events, not because I have some bizarre phobia of social interaction but because after an hour or two of withstanding a social siege my mind is so mentally numbed by all the noise, social interaction, and small talk, that I usually arrive home exhausted and collapse in a tired heap on the futon. This is typical introvert. The upside to being an introvert is that you are almost never bored, and when you are bored it is almost always when you are with other people.
At this point you are probably wondering how this has anything to do with Buenos Aires. This is where I tell you. A city, at least in my opinion, is an introvert's worst nightmare. The barrage of sensory stimuli are everywhere. They are in the form of billboards, advertisements, graffiti, talking, noise, endless traffic, a thousand different coffee shops all advertising their cafe and medialunas promos. The same goes for pizza, pasta, ice cream and just about any other shop you can imagine. For every hour I spend receiving these intense visual stimuli I probably need an hour in peace to re-energize.
This is why the week was so epic. To begin, the week didn't start out very well. In my first class on Monday morning I open my computer to present the lesson and to my shock and horror the computer had died. The several hours after that class were spent walking the streets of el microcentro, the business hub of Buenos Aires, searching for a new power cable. Tuesday wasn't too difficult but Wednesday and Thursday I worked from the early hours of the morning until about 10:30 at night. I actually recall late on Wednesday how the class I had that morning seemed as if it had taken place days before. So much happened that time seemed to stretch to accommodate all of it.
Finally on Friday I inhaled a refreshing breath of relief. I ordered a coffee and some pastries with a friend and we chilled out all Friday afternoon. After the coffee I entered the cave and have been living there until this afternoon, emerging for brief moments to check facebook or write this blog, only to re-enter the cave once my task had been completed.
Just as it began, it must also end. My time in the world is finished for this Sunday. I did my daily run early this morning at about 7:30, Church at 10:30, finished all of my lessons for the week, dinner at 5:30, but still need to find some time to read. One final thing to know about introverts... we are very organized.
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