Pertinent to my Interests

Documentary reviews, body neutrality, parenting, Jupiter, piano, cats, European history, ghosts, rodents, the collapse of civilization, and if this goes on long enough I'll probably end up cataloguing my entire smushed penny collection.

Today, on another episode of “is it normal or is it Casey’s undiagnosed autism…”

One of my favorite things about having a job again is having coworkers.

I love coworkers. I love getting to know how people think and why they are the way they are, and I love knowing the names of their cats and what their spouse’s most annoying habit is. I get to study them and follow along with their stories without the pressure of maintaining a friendship on weekends! And sometimes they bring in baked goods!

I genuinely adore many of my coworkers, and there are many more I am still getting to know.

But here is the hardest part of having coworkers: they like to greet and be greeted in the morning.

I am a not a natural greeter. I have no inclination to mark someone’s appearance or departure with any sort of words. Walk into the room if you must. Walk away if it suits you. Come tell me what your cat got up to last night and we’ll talk, but I just don’t see the point in saying “good morning” when we all know that you’re still getting over covid and yesterday was a tough day in your classroom and you have an observation today.

But people say “good morning.” They say it all the time, regardless of the moral characteristics of that particular morning. And it turns out staring at your computer screen and grunting in response is not considered particularly friendly.

So I’m saying “good morning” now or at least I’m trying to. It feels so unnatural. I feel like an alien who is attempting to assimilate to human culture. A coworker walks through the door and my mind goes through a whole sixteen step process of pumping me up and prepping me to greet them. Just start with the G sound and move carefully into the OO sound… Smile on face! Eye contact! You can do it!

Does everyone feel like this when they are trying to fit into a group? Or is this my undiagnosed autism at play again? Social skills have never come to me naturally and over the years I have made an effort to study what other people do in social situations and then mimic it myself. And I just can’t tell if this is the definition of culture or the definition of autism.