Sometimes I feel it's only the crappy people who need families. The people not enjoyable enough for others to willingly choose to put up with them, they need a form of forced social duty and enact it through guilt and pitty.
That said, especially for elderly people, it could just be circumstances of life that has played into them being lonely.
The issue is, if I'm to open up and invite a stranger in, how do I know which category they belong in? I feel probability wise, chances are they're of the former, and are probably boring, judgmental, uptight, have issues, etc. Which is why they're lonely in the first place.
So while I'd be okay opening up to lovely people, the risk of doing so is too high right now, without it happening organically.
I've seen people saying elsewhere this story was shared that they lived in the area and replied to the CL post, the lady turned out to be some crazy nutjob and it became apparent that there were very good reasons that she had nobody to spend Christmas with.
It's clear just from the NY Times article she was the problem and there's good reasons people don't want to be around her. Most people don't take estranging their parents lightly, especially when they have young children.
> The issue is, if I'm to open up and invite a stranger in, how do I know which category they belong in? I feel probability wise, chances are they're of the former, and are probably boring, judgmental, uptight, have issues, etc. Which is why they're lonely in the first place.
You don't know which category and that's okay.
No one is encouraging you become bffs, let them move in, or even to see them ever again. It's chatting and getting to know someone in a different place in life than you.
If you only let people in your life who are not-boring, not-judgemental, not-uptight, issue-free, etc, you run the risk of being more like the person you'd reject over the person you'd welcome.
> If you only let people in your life who are not-boring, not-judgemental, not-uptight, issue-free, etc, you run the risk of being more like the person you'd reject over the person you'd welcome.
this is SO true. Everybody complaining about "awkwardness" as a big deal must have had a pretty sheltered life...
That said, especially for elderly people, it could just be circumstances of life that has played into them being lonely.
The issue is, if I'm to open up and invite a stranger in, how do I know which category they belong in? I feel probability wise, chances are they're of the former, and are probably boring, judgmental, uptight, have issues, etc. Which is why they're lonely in the first place.
So while I'd be okay opening up to lovely people, the risk of doing so is too high right now, without it happening organically.