Volunteering as a crutch for the socially awkward

I said that I do a little bit more with Stumptown every time. The first time, I just went in, looked around, and left, probably in under fifteen minutes. (It was smaller then.)

I think my second time was when I only went to have Christopher Baldwin sign my Little Dee books. This was the time when he asked if I had a favorite character, and I thought it was small talk, not realizing that he was going to draw one for me, and since I could not pick one he drew all four, but I did not realize until it was still late. I still cringe a little. Obviously this year, with volunteering, talking to more than one person, and attending a panel, was a huge step forward.

I underwent a similar transformation with Blues Fest. In that case, it started as “Zydeco? I love zydeco!”, and then standing around awkwardly, but I found out about volunteering much sooner. I don’t even remember how I first learned about the volunteer opportunities, but that worked well. I’ve done at least one shift there almost every year since I started.

This has been a solution that has worked well for me. If you truly have social anxiety, it might be too much pressure, and you have to judge that for yourself. For me, there’s nothing like that level of severity, nor any reason to believe that medication would be helpful.

I have friends, but due to different interests and different levels of familial responsibility, there are a lot of things that I must do alone or not at all. I also have this deep-seated insecurity where I am constantly worried about annoying people, and sometimes even when I forget it in the course of a good conversation it will suddenly sneak back and make me worry. I am often self-conscious.

Volunteering is a very natural solution for me. It gives me a purpose, and something to do so I am not standing around awkwardly. I am civic-minded anyway, so it aligns well with some of my natural tendencies (service, helpfulness), which bolsters me in the fight against those other natural tendencies (shyness, awkwardness). Also, I am deeply committed to my responsibilities, so give me one and I will carry it out, regardless of the obstacles.

Here is the way my shift went. I started out putting up some signs with a mother and daughter team. Afterwards I helped maintain a break in the line that was outside the exhibition hall waiting for it to open so that convention center traffic could flow. (I minded the gap). Following that, I basically did a concierge gig, which was standing around being available to answer questions.

Now, the last part was actually very much like standing around awkwardly, but I was doing it with a purpose! I would try and make eye contact and smile. Some people avoid eye contact like the plague, and I would periodically feel myself fade a little, and then I would just buck up and smile at the next person, because what else can you do?

And I did answer several questions. About a third of them were directing people to the ceramics exhibit, but you know, there’s no reason for the different events to not coexist peacefully. Actually, it was one of the questions that had me check the program where I decided to attend the Wonder Woman panel.

Afterwards, I had mapped out the people whom I wanted to see. I had to pick up a my Kickstarter package from Alexis Fajardo, buy Life Begins At Incorporation from Matt Bors, get Becky Cloonan to sign The Mire, and have Mike Russell sign Infantile Machismo.

Yes, when I say I mapped that out, that’s literal. I looked up the table numbers and circled them on the map, and also, just having a list of things to do is another facet of keeping myself busy and on task, like with the volunteering. It saves me. (It also means that I sometimes act pretty weird when someone interrupts my flow, but I still think I would be worse without any flow. Probably.)

That was overall positive. I still have no idea what to say when people ask me if I have a favorite character, but that only came up once. I need to start thinking about that beforehand. I think my old aversion to playing favorites is an issue there. One interaction was a little uncomfortable, but that may have been attributable to oncoming illness, and not my being hideous and boring. I hope so anyway.

The other thing that was really helpful was Twitter. First of all, that’s how I discovered the volunteer opportunity, but it also made things a lot more familiar. To some extent it’s a one way familiarity, but I was recognizing faces right and left. That’s Jen Van Meter! I’ve seen him before! I wonder if David Hahn is here? That is Bill Willingham!

It’s not perfect. Not everyone posts actual pictures. I didn’t see any robots or luchadors, though I do now know the face that uses a picture of Totoro. However, more names are familiar, and more work – I click on a lot of links – and it’s nice. I find it helpful.

Obviously, I could engage more. There’s always next year, and I am volunteering at Rose City (they look a little more Hollywood though; we’ll see how it goes). Also, it could be legitimate to point out that I am enabling my weaknesses, rather than overcoming them, and kind of continuing in the overfunctioner vein. Perhaps, but I did have a good time. I actually exceeded expectations because I got five signatures instead of four and I attended the panel. And also, I did a really good job of keeping that gap for traffic open.