Someone recently asked me what my hobbies are. I think I gave a blank stare. Then I said I like to write. I couldn’t think of anything else. Is that strange? To not know, right off the top of my head, what things I enjoy doing? It sort of through me for a loop that I was thrown for a loop.
I started thinking about it, and it is true that there aren’t a lot of specific things that I like to do “for fun”. Oddly, though, when thinking about what I most enjoy doing, one-on-one conversations is what came to mind first. I love to learn by talking to people – asking questions, challenging and being challenged, laughing, and being known enough to be laughed at – which is probably why most of what Tim and I do together is talk.
But I don’t know that conversing counts as a hobby. So, after thinking for a while longer, I realized there are things I like to do…things like drawing and cooking and playing the clarinet and singing…they just don’t come to mind right away because, somehow, I feel like I should be good at the things I say I like to do. If I hear that someone likes to paint, I assume they have some talent. I worry someone would assume that I have talent – or that I think I have talent – if I said I like to do something. I’m probably more likely to say that I “try” doing things, and to go out of my way to make sure that someone knows that I’m not any good at those things, than I am to say that I do any of those things as a hobby.
The other thing I realized is that there are things that might be considered “hobbies” that I do a lot of that I don’t necessarily enjoy, but do because I like the end result. Gardening, or baking, or preserving food, for instance. Not really my favorite things in the world to actually do, but I love what is produced, so I do them. Does that mean they’re hobbies? I wouldn’t consider them such, but maybe that’s just me.
Ugh. Sometimes I wish my brain would just function normally.