Real Conversation #8: Family (Gabriel & Kevin)

Kevin: Exactly.

The fun most definitely I feel like it diminishes because you're just sloppy, incoherent. You are not essentially thinking. You're more just doing. Gabriel: Just doing, stumbling around.

Kevin: Stumbling around, you don't even remember a lot of what you did, what you said, how embarrassing something may have been that you said to someone.

So, it's just not a fun way. I 100% agree with you to have a fun night, I could even have a good time without drinking at all. Gabriel: Yeah, same here.

And I think that that's… I'm guessing though, that is also because of the fact that – you know I'm going to say this as a side note – Kevin is a very social guy. That's, you know... We met in a social setting and I think that... I can probably objectively say that neither of us is very shy like normally, right? And I have shy friends that rely on alcohol to speak to people. Because they're too shy to interact with people so they want to loosen a little bit with alcohol and then... Then do that, right? Since thankfully, you know, and I think we're very blessed perhaps in this regard that, although of course you know there's nothing wrong with being shy but I think that if someone is relying on alcohol to talk to people, that is not a good thing. Kevin: Absolutely.

And I'll tell you a bit of a personal thing about myself with regards to this exact topic. It's that in high school, I was not a very shy... I'm naturally not shy, I love talking to people, but I had switched high schools a couple of times in my youth, and switching high schools to an environment that was 100% new; new kids, new peers to look up to, new teachers, new environment overall I was at first very stifled and shy to fit into that environment, especially with the kids that I could see were the (quote unquote) "more popular kids", I felt that in order for me to become friends with them, I'd have to act in a more over-the-top fun charismatic way, which actually made me more shy when I interacted with them. So, in the earlier stages of my teenagehood, because of this change of environment I became a little more on the shy side. Gabriel: Oh, so you were shy, yes?

Kevin: I was more shy.

When it came to talking with girls? I was very shy, I didn't know how to really talk to a girl. Gabriel: Yeah, that's normal for a young man.

Kevin: That's normal, I think it's normal for some people have it at a very natural early stage. I did honestly have that when I was really young n elementary, but then I switched from two different parts of Vancouver, I used to live in Yaletown, close to downtown until the age of 12, 13, and then I moved to North Vancouver in Lynn Valley. And in “North Van” I switched high school two times, that kind of made it a little difficult to find friends at first. So going back to even the drinking I remember when I first went to a party and I drank, it definitely opened me up but I got to the realization that I can do this without alcohol as well.