No One Ever Asks

No one ever takes the time to ask me what I’m interested in. They have no idea about all the things I like.  

It was a defining moment in our conversation.

We were just meeting him for the first time.  His girlfriend, who was with him, we already knew.

At first sight, he was intimidating. Tall and husky, like a football player. A knit cap pulled down to his eyes. Bearded and unsmiling. It took some time to engage him in the conversation.

It would have been easy to write him off. He looked as if he didn’t want to be there, as if he really didn’t care about talking to us or about his wedding. It seemed as if he was enduring this meeting to please his girlfriend and to humor us.

Photo by Priscilla Du Preez 🇨🇦 on Unsplash 

But then a song came on in the background at the restaurant where we were meeting. Off in his own world, he quietly began to sing along. It was surprising that he even know it. It was song from the 80’s. He’s 26. It was on the charts well before his time.

His fiancé looked at me and said,

It’s his ADD.

That brought him back to wedding conversation.
 

Yeah. I’ve had it since I was a kid in school. It was always getting me in trouble. I hear music and then I am drawn to it.

One of us asked,
 

What kind of music do you like?

Everything, he replied, engaged. Classical. Maybe we outta have “Moonlight Sonata” at the wedding. Rock. Pop. Billy Joel. Elton John. I love Sinatra, the whole Rat Pack. Musicals.

 Musicals? Wow. Which ones do you like?

 Lion King. Cats. Les Miz. Phantom. 

You never would have guessed it. He looked like one of the least likely guys to love the kind of music he was listing. But this discussion was really engaging him. He quickly began opening up more about his life and the wedding, their relationship and how they initially bonded over music like he had bonded with no one else before. He was enthusiastic. Really talkative now.

That’s when he quietly exclaimed,
 

No one ever takes the time to ask me what I’m interested in. They have no idea about all the things I like.

No one ever takes the time. No one ever asks. No one ever has any idea.

Here was this big, initially sullen-looking guy, his eyes wide now, animated, smiling, sharing some really basic things about himself and who he is, that rarely is he ever invited to share.

How often do we write others off simply because of their appearance or their initial demeanor? How often, then, do we not make the effort to go just even a little deeper with them, missing out on getting to know what they like, how they think, what they love – who they are?

How many of us feel the way this young man has felt – that no one is interested, that they can’t be bothered to make a better effort to really get to know who we are?

Everyone has something to say. Everyone has something to offer. When we simply take the time, just even a little time, we can be wonderfully surprised about whom we meet and what they have to share. And when we do, who knows just what might be revealed, what might ignite someone to be reminded that someone else does care? Who knows what just might help someone – including us – come more alive?