In 2017, I read a book by Susan Cain, “Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World that Can’t Stop Talking”, published in 2012, by Crown Publishing/Random House. I found this book to be excellent because it helped me realize that introverts are probably one-third of the population. There are a lot of people like me, that prefer quiet times to noisy parties. Shortly after I read the book, I wrote a blog about it, which you can read here. I hope I’m not going to repeat myself too much, as this time I would like to write about my world as a 74-year old introvert with a hearing disability.
As my hearing gets worse, and it gets harder to be part of large groups, I find that being an introvert helps me cope with my disability. Hearing aids work to a certain extent, but all of the background noise of the world we live in is also increased in volume, not only the voices of the people that I would like to converse with. This has resulted in several types of changes in my behavior.
In particular, towns and shopping areas have a lot of noise pollution. The other day, I noticed that a neighboring child had an electric motor to his play tractor and I found that noisy too. Walking on gravel is noisy under my feet and can drown out conversation with the person I am walking with. I actually like doing things by myself as then I don’t have to use a hearing aid and I can enjoy the peace around me.
I now avoid almost all activities that include large groups of people in an indoor room. People are always talking, or at least some of them are, and when more than one person is talking, I hear nothing and it becomes very frustrating to not hear what people say. I still enjoy being with people, and enjoy having discussions about serious topics, but maximum four people in the room, with no background noise, is what I manage best.
One activity I really enjoy is walking in nature, either by myself or with someone. I have one girl friend who I walk with regularly. We avoid the places with the most car noises and in the summer months we often take some of the Inderøy walks where one can get points for getting to a particular place. Most of these walks are away from roads with cars on them. I also do a lot of walking with my husband, mostly in the summer months, but also in the winter. The photo above was taken in Mosvik on one of these walks.
As a retired person, I don’t have to go out to work every day, but there are still lots of things to fill my time. I enjoy cooking and often spend one to two hours a day on food preparation. I have to use hearing protection when using noisy kitchen machines, but that is usually just a few minutes of the processing time. I avoid using my hearing aids while working in the kitchen as even chopping vegetables is a noisy activity.
I love knitting and always have one to three projects on the go, plus all the ones that are in the planning stages in my head. Keeping my fingers busy while creating something useful gives me something meaningful to do. Knitting gives me lots of time to think while my fingers keep busy. To cut down on the overload in my head, from thinking, I often read while doing simple knitting.
Reading has always been a favorite activity and I read both fiction and non-fiction. Most books are read on an electronic reader, but I have also started reading a few books on paper. The latter are not so easy to read when knitting, but newer non-fiction books are good for stimulating my mind. This has also been a reason for starting to write a few blogs again, at least until the gardening season starts. I’m currently reading a book about the state of the world, but the blog about it won’t be ready for another week, hence today’s topic.
Gardening is another hobby, which does not require much interaction with other people and which doesn’t require me to hear well either. In fact, with a lot of traffic on a nearby bridge, it is better to not be wearing a hearing-aid while outdoors working. I have a garden that is really far too big to keep in very good condition, but I have the rule, “what gets done, gets done” and I don’t worry about what doesn’t get done.
Shopping is a necessity, but I choose to do my shopping when there are relatively few people in the stores, either in the morning, or the evening. It pays to learn when there are fewer people in the stores that one uses a lot. I started this in particular during the pandemic, but have found that whether I’m buying food, building supplies or yarn, the time of day, and the day of the week makes a big difference to how many people are in the stores.
Being an introvert has made reducing group activities easy for me. Contact with others is still important, but the situation has to be something I can handle. There are lots of meaningful activities for introverts and for those with a hearing disability. Life is for living and I hope to have many years yet.