Reading Time: 5 minutes
Our law library had an open house recently and some of the governing board were there. They reminded me of the first time I met them in person. One recounted that they had driven me home that evening—I had arrived by bus—and I realized that it was essentially the last time I’d ridden in someone’s car since I arrived in the city over 2 years ago. Since I don’t use ride-share services, I get around San Diego on foot or public transit.
I try to do the same thing wherever I go. It doesn’t always work. A recent trip up to Stanford involved trains and walking. The WestPac conference in Reno was an anomaly, as I was able to walk from the airport to the hotel since I had plenty of time. I didn’t want to walk back due to my flight time, though, and the busses were cancelled. I had to quickly figure out how to use Lyft to see if I could get a car in time.
I can drive. When one of our kids came out here, we drove out to the Salton Sea. And when I’m back in Canada, I use the vehicle that’s available to help with chores and shuttling. I just don’t drive (or ride in cars) when I don’t have to.
Why? No one at the open house asked and I didn’t volunteer. It’s also not a simple answer. I’m extremely fortunate to be able to have affordable housing near where I work. It’s an urban environment so it’s reliably paved, if not always accessible. I’m mobile and so do not need mobility aid. I don’t want to pay car insurance or own a car that will get little use, nor pay to park it. I have not commuted by car in nearly 20 years. I can’t stand combustion engines.
It’s a choice. It’s not one I evangelize because it’s my choice, not necessarily a choice for everyone. Also, I don’t know the reasons that cause other people to make their choices.
Some people need cars to get to work because other parts of their lives mandate it. Some people want cars as an asset, or marker of luxury, or to fit in. Increasingly, some people may want a car to ensure they have a place to sleep. To walk or not to walk, to drive or not to drive, isn’t a simple yes-no option.
It reminds me of drinking alcohol. It is rare for me to go to an event with lawyers that doesn’t involve alcohol. Like driving, I do drink alcohol but never at a social or work event and only under exceptionally rare circumstances and with people I have known for decades.
Unlike walking, not drinking tends to make people uncomfortable. Unlike walking, they will ask why I’m not drinking. It’s always a bit funny to me because legal professionals are more likely than most to have a colleague with a substance abuse problem. Perhaps they don’t know that.
It’s the curiosity that I always find interesting. “Why don’t you drink?” The assumption is that it’s substance abuse. Or a health-related issue. I get that sometimes with my standing desk, like a person would only want a standing desk for curative reasons, rather than for preventative ones. Or that desks and tables tend to be built for an average person, and if you’re taller, they’re uncomfortable.
I usually say something benign about alcohol: the cost, or not having a taste for the available options, or having to walk home, or something that doesn’t leave them uncomfortable. Not that 20% of the room may have a substance abuse problem and I want someone to feel like they’re not the only person who isn’t drinking. Or that I really don’t like most alcohols’ taste (Lindemann’s Cassis excluded). Or how it makes me feel, either immediately or in 12 hours. Or that it might bring back memories of saying or doing things that I regret.
People drink for complicated reasons. I don’t know why someone does. Perhaps they are able to feel more confident or meet expectations. Or subdue monsters in their head. Or they’re alcholics. Perhaps they grew up on a vineyard. Or they feel they’ve arrived when they can display their nose for wine or their wisdom on spirits.
Alcohol makes people uncomfortable. No one explains to my why they have a car. Or why they sit at their desk. They’ll usually tell me a reason why they are drinking.
Part of me wants to know those answers. What choices are you making that minimize an option to walk for health? Or to avoid using a car for climate change? Or to create relationships without using drugs? How does your experience, your life, your values, differ from mine?
I’m curious, as I think anyone who works in a library tends to be. When you have a relationship with someone, you can gain the context necessary to ask questions, and to understand the answers, but so many of our interactions are too superficial for that.
At the same time, I don’t want to intrude to sate that curiosity because I know that an answer isn’t necessarily helpful or informative for me or the person answering. We do not even tell ourselves the truth, let alone people who ask about our thoughts or deeds. And we don’t tell the truth for as many complicated reasons as why we choose to walk or drive, to drink or abstain, to stand or sit.
As I was reflecting on this milestone of 2+ years without a car ride in San Diego, it made me think more about how important it is to take people at face value. I suppose I’m not different from most people when I search for motive or for the unsaid. We want to be helpful and friendly but not to be taken advantage of. We want our sharing of resources—attention, compassion, advice, expertise, alliance—to be well received and possibly reciprocated.
But you don’t want to be bamboozled. You don’t want to be led down the primrose path! You don’t want to be conned or duped. Have the wool pulled over your eyes. Hoodwinked! You don’t want to be taken for a ride. Railroaded!
Hobo to The Boy, The Polar Express
That can be so hard in a library environment. Public services people essentially need to reset, over and over again, as they deal with each interaction. How to get enough information to help but not seek in areas where answers may not be shared.
As a director, I find it more periodic. In our library, I find that people will, over time, be more forthcoming about why they are seeking in a given direction or in need of something. They’re more open to me asking about something and sharing the good and the bad, the successes and the mistakes.
It’s harder, and, again, I’m sure I’m not alone, when dealing with external colleagues. These are people you may not work with often, or for longer than a discrete project. Your awareness of their existence—how they are doing at work, or at home, or with relationships anywhere in the world—may be small to non-existent. I think that, when people say they click, it’s that they have found a shared plateau of curiosity and knowledge or an agreement to commit to a shared understanding whether they believe or are invested in the truth of it or not.
For me, it is harder when that shared understanding doesn’t exist with potential colleagues. In theory, these are people I need to grow with, network with, connect to, share experiences with. People who work in law schools, and courts, and other law libraries are for the most part moving in the same world as me.
But when conflict arises or misunderstanding, it can be hard to revert to that lack of curiosity. To give them the benefit of the doubt, to not try to search for motives or the unsaid. This is particularly true when things aren’t going well and you may be shading those motives negatively because your experience is negative.
Sometimes, when I revert to trying to focus on what I think of as face value, it can help. Are they being truthful? Sincere? How would you know? More importantly: would it help to know? I generally believe that it is not worth trying to know the unknowable when it comes to people. At face value, I can look at their actions and what they say and go from there. I feel as though it’s more constructive to give them space to explain or communicate what they want to share, and let that accrete as the relationship grows.
That is not always a successful tactic, though. It can make people feel like you aren’t listening to them, that you’ve disengaged. Unlike the person who has stopped you for directions on the street, this may be someone who also feels like they should be invested in networking, relationship building, and group acceptance. My withdrawal, my reluctance, may be seen as negative behavior when all I’m trying to do is return to a more neutral state.
Ironically, it reminds me less of people’s acceptance of my walking and is more like their quizzicalness around drinking. If I’m not drinking, am I making a social (conformist) judgment about someone who is? If I pull back from a negative interaction with a colleague, am I trying to exclude them from the community (or plan to)? Or am I excluding myself (taking marbles and going home, not a ‘team’ player, etc.)? Some relationships will cause more need for curiosity because of the context.
The one real benefit to walking that I will extol is the ability to think about all of this other cruft while you’re on the go! I don’t really have to worry about traffic except at intersections and a trail can go for miles without interruption.
It has made me slow down, because it takes me time to get anywhere. And while most businesses do not see thinking as “work”, I do find the walking time useful for working through these interactions in my head. I find that I can engage in the assumptions and motives and realize it, backing off from that guesswork. It’s a little like my own twice-daily reset, to dump out the imaginary trappings I may have wrapped around any given interaction or relationship.
It’s not for everyone. But it’s a daily reminder that a lot of choices other people make, or the experiences they’ve had, are not things that I can see or assume are like mine.