dimly lit, but nice

[jay]

This evening, after a bit of friction with patgreene, I went up to House Dreamland's housewarming party around 10pm... it was a party. Pretty good, a bit crowded, lots of people I'd never met or only seen once or twice. My soon-to-be boss at work, RD was also there (invited by hopeforyou... he knew no one else there besides her and I, so I talked with him much of the time. To the exclusion of several other people with whom I would have liked to spend more time, granted, but I felt that I needed to be responsible and welcoming where RD was concerned (and hopeforyou was too busy hostessing).

But I nonetheless got a chance to have a nice talk with charlottesmtms, probably longer than if I'd gone to tomorrow's brunch. And my housewarming gifts seem to have been put to good use. And I should find a way to see brooksmoses more often... however, rosemom wasn't there tonight, pity.

OTOH, rosefox looked beautiful and stylish in her long black dress (another LBD ;)! circusscreamer had a lovely scarf woven through her hair, and she and bikerscum and karenbynight and others were exchanging clothing outfits for awhile... I have a photo *).

There was a power outage at one point... people who were there with a partner or two could cuddle in the dim candlelight. Which diminishes conversation, at least verbal... less fun for the non-partnered, but that's our problem. I actually left the party feeling a bit touch-deprived...

Which reminds me that I don't know the etiquette for dealing with puppy piles at parties, as a general issue. Do I pretend that they aren't there and look through them? Try to avoid glancing in their given direction? Or smile and make vaguely salacious remarks in their general direction? What if the pile includes people I'm otherwise friends with? I don't know whether I should respect their privacy (even on the floor at a gathering) and not officially recognize them as present... or pretend that nothing is going on, and try to chat with them while standing at the edge and looking downwards. It isn't an easy situation, IMO...

Comments

[brooksmoses]

[nonverbal negotiation for sharing space]
(palms open) I lack context, sorry. I've never done this, or had it happen to me. If I'm interested in sitting closer to someone, in their personal space, and a seat next to that person opens on a couch... I've always held back, waiting for an explicit invitation. Otherwise, I'm afraid that I'll annoy that person by sitting too close, and they'll dislike me and leave.

Have you watched other people do it? That was one of the fascinating things about your post, and why I wrote such a long response, in part -- I read it while the memories of interactions at the party were still fresh in my mind, and I could go back through them and see how some of these things happened, and pick out the nonverbal negotiations that I hadn't really consciously been paying attention to at the time. But it can be really interesting (and possibly useful) to watch how other people interact, and when they end up cuddling without verbal negotiation, to see how they got there.

I think the key is this: if a space opens, and you sit there (often with a verbal "May I?" request -- but at this point you're asking for a communal space, not for getting into their personal space, so they're really unlikely to feel particularly uncomfortable about it), then you wait, talking to them but not moving into their space. It is now their turn to make a move -- you wait, and watch how they're dealing with the shared space. If they're comfortable sharing space and wish to indicate such, they'll indicate this by moving closer, often in a manner that's sort of by relaxing in that direction instead of overtly moving. At this point, you're showing that you're receptive to this, by not really moving away to compensate. Eventually, if they do this enough to get a notable bit closer, it can be your turn again, and you can try moving a little closer to them, and see if they respond by moving away and being slightly tenser, or by being receptive and relaxed. This process then repeats.

At least, that's my theoretical understanding, based on a small number of datapoints and a large amount of semi-logical conjecture. *grin* I realize that having a theory isn't all that much help in doing this in practice, though -- for one thing, it completely glosses over how to tell how comfortable the other person is. (It does, at least, address the "annoy them by sitting too close" issue -- the trick, I think, is that you position yourself at a distance that is sufficiently far away that their personal space is respected, but close enough to invite them to move closer if they wish to. And then it's up to them to be closer or not.)

[an art to this nonverbal negotiation]
Probably. But applied to flirting, or cuddling, or social situations in general -- I'm clueless. I'm capable of standing across and pining for someone across the room that themselves is sitting ignored on a loveseat... because I don't know if they'd want my company, and don't want to bother that person.

Seeble. [1]

At best, I mostly just look like I have clue, I think. And sometimes have things work out, usually by someone being obvious enough to get past the cluelessness. And occasionally I notice enough to have things to say about it, and someone happens to ask at just the right time that I end up working out what I've noticed in lots of words in response.

I do think it's something that one can learn to get better at, by watching how other people do it....


[1] Have you come across this in your corners of usenet? It's a verbish thing, meaning essentially "I am your sibling in this", although with far less formality than that phrasing.

[brian1789.livejournal.com]

Have you watched other people do it?

No. I've noticed person A approaching person B, and sometime later they're cuddled, but I've always assumed that it was because they were partners or exes or were otherwise already on "touchable" terms. It seems magical, in the sense that there's no observed activity and then *poof* something changes. So I haven't seen any identifiable nonverbal negotiations.

at this point you're asking for a communal space

I worry about bothering others by being in their nearby communal space, too, enough so that I hold back from asking for empty seats on trains and busses, likewise in restaurants.

It is now their turn to make a move -- you wait

Pretty much what I do, except that I wait for the other person to move first -- it's the only way to be sure that my presence is welcome.

if they do this enough to get a notable bit closer, it can be your turn again

I actually had a chance to try this a bit today, after lunch. Mixed results...

I mostly just look like I have clue, I think.

Don't underestimate yourself... besides, simply projecting expertise and confidence is 80% of the task, in other, non-social realms.

Have you come across this in your corners of usenet?

(grin) yes... a couple of years ago, after seeing it used for a few years beforehand, I finally asked for its definition (on alt.poly)...

[bdot.livejournal.com]

1. what is seeble?

2. i am not a puppy pile type person, but i do know that if you want to join and you don't want to just sit down, then you have to ask. the worse that anyone can say is no. getting over shyness has been one of my hardest mountains to climb...and i'm only about half way up. notice, i disappeared for large amounts of time at the party!

[brooksmoses]

what is seeble?

See the note after "[1]" at the bottom of my previous reply. (The business with the "[1]"s is a convention for doing footnotes in some of the newsgroups I frequent; I'd forgotten that not everyone does them that way!) Basically, it's an expression of siblingness -- a genderfree way of expressing "Sister!"

[brooksmoses]

No. I've noticed person A approaching person B, and sometime later they're cuddled, but I've always assumed that it was because they were partners or exes or were otherwise already on "touchable" terms. It seems magical, in the sense that there's no observed activity and then *poof* something changes. So I haven't seen any identifiable nonverbal negotiations.

Well, I did notice a fair bit of it in one case because I was directly involved (basically, it happened, and I spent some time afterwards wondering how it happened!); in a lot of cases it can be somewhat subtle and hard to see unless you're looking for it, I suspect.

In that particular case, your assumption about being already on "touchable" terms wasn't at all true. And she did make a move that could quite easily have been unwelcome. I don't know if it was obvious to her from my body language (and my reactions to accidental touches) that I would welcome it, but it wasn't even obvious to me until she did it. Sometimes, you have to take risks, and just believe they'll be ok. :)