The Little Things

I think far too often we are too caught up in our own world at the bereft of our relationship with others - leading to an overt fixation upon oneself to a degree of unhealthy self-absorption. I find this to be true of a lot of people in my age bracket, perhaps because we are all at the same juncture of our lives in which our future is filled with so much uncertainty. I'm not innocent of this either.

Worst of all are those who don't truly listen, but merely wait for their turn to speak.I have to admit to being a part of conversations where I've already tuned out, and am only nodding along or only half-listening. So I get off-guard when I'm in a conversation, and the other person does a "callback" - by that I mean when said person brings up a minute and fairly innocuous anecdotal detail that you shared with this person months or even years ago. It always catches me by surprise because you expect the other person to forget (and a lot of times you forget yourself). But it's actually heartwarming and makes you appreciate that person a little more, because well they thought it significant enough to store in their memory, and so they must have been paying attention and cared.