Have you Hugged Your Someone Today?

It's a moment of awwwwww! Cuteness overdose.

But it got me thinking. Especially in conjunction with several of the movies and TV episodes I've watched in the last week. By some odd coincidence several of my random choices have had primary or secondary themes dealing with relationship, connections, intimacy, the communication of caring or lack thereof. Not necessarily of the romantic variety. Mostly not in fact. Family, friend, colleagues, neighbors...

These stories impact me strongly as they force me to see the state of such things in my own life. They show me how connections between individuals need cultivating and, except in the case of adult to small child, the responsibility belongs to both parties.

I confess that I am one who seeks out solitude. I shy away from touch let alone hugs, from eye contact let alone the sharing of intimate thoughts, from almost any form of social engagement in fact of both the formal event kind and the informal interpersonal. I have severe social anxiety and can barely tolerate social occasions without being stoned on serotonin.

Most of the time I'm content in my solitude. But every once in a while I find myself craving connection, caring, acknowledgement, the give and take of conversation and find it too often unavailable and realize I have no one to blame but myself for I've so carefully constructed the emotional defenses against connection comparable to that of a porcupine against its predator. Who wants to cultivate closeness with that?

Maybe I need to take lessons from the cats who counterbalance their claws, teeth and hisses with nose nudges, purring and cuddles. They are well known for their preference of solitude and their prickly rebuff of unwanted advances but they also crave a certain amount of connection and closeness and know how to cultivate it if their trust is not betrayed.