Introvert v. Extrovert

(please note, Keirsey people: it is EXTROVERT, not extravert, for the love of god.)

As previously mentioned, I have started testing as an I instead of an E in the MBTI personality type tests. I have two theories about this.

1. I have always been a "slightly expressed extrovert." That is, I was a few degrees into E territory. Now that I've lived a while, and gotten used to myself, know myself more, I am now testing more on the other side of neutral, as "slightly expressed introvert." A change by a few degrees, but nothing earth-shattering.

2. I am grieving and DIFFERENT, and am testing as an introvert, because of the decided lack of interest that everyone has for interacting with someone who is grieving. No one wants to hear about it past a month. No one cares, apparently. You get a lot of "I wish I knew what to say." Yeah, well, if you have that much trouble reaching within to find something for me, then either you are shallow and not good friend material, OR you have some block about the whole thing, and I really need friends who grok the grief thing, even if they are projecting, intuiting and guessing, rather than working from experience.

Maybe it's both. I find myself feeling closer to people who have lost someone they love to death. It's not enough that they don't get along, or have been shunned or whatever. There's still a chance of a conversation.

I remember acutely hearing my mother's voice on the answering machine months after she died. I saved and saved that message. When I changed accounts, I made a special point to record the message so I would have it always. I know the words by heart.... it wasn't her last message to me but it was the "wedding" call.

When I went to record it, somehow it was gone. I'd saved and saved it... for months. Resaved and resaved. But it was just ... gone.

Yeah.

So maybe I'm not a very fun person to be around, and that's why I withdraw from folks. My interactions lately are not satisfying and "energizing" me. They deplete me. (Ha ha, Jerry McGuire joke.) I just cleared out my In Box, for example. At least four messages have made me physically cringe. I'm cutting down on the volume of email, but still having to deal with it pulls me down.

The phone calls. Thank god for Caller ID.

It's almost mind-numbing to think of how taxing it all is lately.

And so what I wonder is: is this permanent? will it change when I'm "done" grieving? what am I missing by not "getting back on the horse"?

If I were to get back on the horse, where the hell is it?

(Jots down on list "Look for the Horses.")