a daily phone call

"Hi, Sis. What have you done today?" (The usual start for our phone conversations)
"Not much. Slow Saturday. What about you?"
"Not much either."
One would think that this kind of start would predict a quick end to the chat. Not with us.
She speaks about her plans for dinner, about cleaning windows, about going for a walk.
I share Mimm's treasure hunt game, about hubby taking a nap after making lunch, about upcoming student led conferences. I mention reading "Quiet"* by Susan Cain.
"I have come to a conclusion that I am probably an introvert," I suggest.
"What makes you think that?"
"Well I'd rather be at home than in a big crowd. You know how extroverts always know what to speak about in the crowd, I don't."
"They live active lives, so they have what to talk about. But if going out or staying home is the basis for definition, then we are both very content with staying home and drinking tea. Then again if our hubbies see us with our mom, we talk non-stop. They would call us extroverts."
We laugh at how we talk seemingly without taking a breath. We do the same during the phone call. Topics switch from weather, to curtains, to plants, to furniture, to exercise, to TV shows, to google reader closing down, to blogs we read. I brief her about my phone call with mom, she updates me on J.'s (my nephew) new reading books. We map the rest of our family as introverts. Still not sure about mom and us.
"See how nothing happened and we still talked with each other for more than an hour," my sis points out.
"Yes, but none of these topics would have been very entertaining for others. Nothing intellectual or cultural," I point back.
"Well you mentioned reading a book," she finds one.
"Yes, that makes me deep and interesting."
"May-be there is a category of introverts who within their family talk uncontrollably."
"Did you know that in Asian cultures talking is often viewed upon as waste of time? Quiet is the sign of deep thought," I share a bit of what I had read.
"So in the crowd we can pretend we are in deep thought," my sis suggest.
We laugh again. With each other we don't count the minutes we spend on talking. We absolutely enjoy talking about nothing, about something, about anything, about everything. We decide that even though our phone calls are long, we are introverts, just because we are Estonians and that it's carried in our genes.
Before hanging up we talk a bit more about our plans for the evening, for the next week, for the next weekend. We dream about spring.



* In "Quiet" Susan Cain combines research findings, with stories of famous introverts and with personal stories. She shows the power of introverts and the challenges they face in a world that values extroverts. A fascinating book.