befriend my coworkers

Two years ago I lamented that I am not friends with my coworkers, so added befriending my coworkers as a goal to 43 Things. Two years later I am scarcely better friends with my coworkers than I was then. Yet I don’t consider myself as having failed, necessarily.

The problem that I was trying to solve, I believe, is that of electronic decontextualisation. So much of my life happens interpersonally and online; my life has long lacked social connection with people in real life.

When I worked at la Madeleine, I had a number of regular customers with whom I could sit down and chat. Moreover, at almost any time, I could strike up conversations with new customers, as I did with a philosophy professor from University of Dallas. The ability to make tangible connections at whim is something my previous job offered but my present one does not. It was a big way in which my life had less decontextualisation than it havs now.

Being a member of a community of those who share an interest is something that I have also lacked, something that I could pick up with my coworkers, but I just haven’t been interested in my job itself, because it is filled with decontextualisation. I work with my hands alone, either on computers or at a computer. My conversations are online except for boring conference calls. No one else has my job. Finding a way out of decontextualisation at my job would require changing my job, not merely befriending my coworkers.

These days I have capoeira and swing dancing. Both are communities which have stable membership, capoeira more than swing dancing. There is physical interaction among the members of both groups, which is beautiful. There are also opportunities for social get-togethers with members outside the groups . . . as evidenced by my recent dating of one of the people in my swing dance class, and by the capoeira party I will soon attend. I’m beginning to appreciate this slow building of familiarity with a group as whole through simple participation.

My life slowly gets filled with more and more real activities and real communities, and I slowly reduce the demesne of electronic networking in my life. In some time, perhaps a year, I hope to be able to say not that I’ve befriended coworkers, but that I’ve become part of tangible communities.

I had lunch a couple weeks ago with another coworker. It was amicable enough, but it became clear that we’re just too different to have much to talk about. I’m at a different stage of life from most of my coworkers, do it is difficult sometimes.

Tuesday I had lunch with my boss and we discussed some rather NSFW topics. I like that I can connect with my boss on a personal level even though our lifestyles and life choices are very different. I’m also starting to feel more like I belong here, and starting to be a little more social, going to more office gatherings and such. It is a goodness.

I loaned The Female Thing to my boss last week. Hopefully we’ll have a chance to discuss it. At my jobs, the best relationship was always with my boss. I guess this job will be no different.

One of my best work environments was that at BASF. When I was bored with working, I’d sit in a coworker’s office and chat for half an hour. I got along well with almost all of my coworkers. I made it a point to sit and chat with each of them at least once. In this company, I don’t really socialise with anyone. It’s partially because of having worked in the restaurant business (all work, no play when you’re on the clock), and partially because I felt so very behind when I first started here. Now I think I should make myself some friends.