Last week, I went to Salt Lake City with the Men's Chorus for a performance at the big ACDA (American Choral Directors Association) convention, held on Temple Square. Sister Hall, our director, had been preparing us for this performance since before the completion of the audition process, so she felt it pretty important. We sang well, and the audience of choral conductors from around the country was impressed, at least according to those who bothered to to mention it. And I think we honestly did share with the audience a Feeling they perhaps hadn't felt in that way. I questioned how my performance had personally been, but I couldn't doubt our performance as a group.
The bus and hotel aspects of the trip brought me back to high school choir trips a bit, though, needless to say, a trip with nigh unto two hundred adult men is not the same as a trip with sixty high school teenagers. Thankfully, the Men in Men's Chorus don't flirt amongst themselves (with one possible exception, hopefully nothing every blogworthy), but I felt a bit out of place. The men are nice, and a lot of them are my age; I even talked myself into accepting an invitation to play a card game with some guys on the way up to SLC. But I really don't have any 'buddies' in there, like I did in high school choir, and since there was no one to flirt with, I mostly just wandered, trying not to look pathetic or pitiful. I tried this by actually trying to make friends with the other guys. I walked around the mall and the Conference Center during free time with the guy I share my folder with, and that was good, but it wasn't anything like having one of my high school buddies. On the bus trip back, immediately following our concert, I couldn't find even him, so I found an empty seat and sat, preparing myself to spend the hour-and-fifteen-minute trip reading Anna Karenina. However, I had chosen the bus in front, meaning the first bus to leave, meaning the bus had to be filled before it could leave, meaning some random guy in Men's Chorus sat next to me because there weren't any open rows left. It's taken me awhile to get to the point of this whole thing, but stick with it: I'm finally there. This guy who sits next to me seemed to be an average, ordinary member of the Church with assumably a passable singing voice.
"Can I sit here?"
"Sure," I responded. I had no reason to say otherwise.
This was followed by several minutes of silence, listening to the guys next to us reading Laffy-Taffy jokes, and staring at the headrests of the seats in front of us.
The bus I had chosen happened to be the bus that had to go back to our performing place to load some things. It took a couple minutes to get there, then the bus stopped, some guys left to go get the stuff, and everyone else just waited on the bus.
Another couple of minutes passed.
As I had spent the trip, feebly maybe, trying to not be a loner and trying to get to know the other guys (Sister Hall encourages feelings of brotherhood), I decided to initiate conversation.
Give me advice. Maybe here's where I went wrong.
"What's your name?"
"Andrew." A pause. "What's yours?"
"Dallin."
A conscious attempt on my part not to ask anything cliche or trite.
Attempt.
I can't remember exactly, but I made some comment about Salt Lake City or asked him where he was from or something.
"I'm from Holladay," Andrew muttered, Holladay being a suburb of SLC.
"Oh," and I got this connection-finding conversationary mechanism from my Mom, "my aunt and uncle live in Taylorsville. Is that anywhere near Holladay?" Taylorsville is also a suburb of SLC.
"I think so. I've only been there once, on accident."
I tried to humor him, but I really didn't find it especially amusing.
Another couple minutes passed, and we were still waiting along the side of the road at Temple Square for the rest of the guys to load the stuff and re-board the bus.
This time it was Andrew who spoke first.
"Well, it was nice meeting you."
Like a wall, with a moat in front of it, filled with venomous pirahnas, misted o'er by flaming fog, he shut me out with that simple comment. We hadn't even left SLC yet; we still had over an hour to sit next to each other. Usually that comment is reserved for when the destination is reached, for that comment effectively kills any further conversation save an agreement and return of the 'compliment.' So, we both took naps. And neither of us had anything to say when we got back to Provo.
At least I learned his name?