I know. You hate small talk. I get it. You hear the phrase “small talk” and you think of some boring neighborhood dork saying things like “can you believe all this rain?” when you randomly pass them walking the dog.
You fight the desire to roll your eyes, so you muster up a short, one-word response: “Crazy”. Then you give a quick smile and you shuffle off, happy to be rid of this time-sucking exchange you deem worthless.
You think this exchange is worthless because you feel like you’re not going to get anything out of it. Yeah, it’s rained a lot lately. You know it. I know it. Why do we have to talk about it?
You probably have the Seinfeld bit queued up in your head about how he hates pointless conversation and how humans get stuck in them because of dumb social norms. The punchline is that he’d rather just walk by everyone and say “acknowledge”, meaning, whatever boring daily drivel you’re about to drone on about or say because you think you have to, I acknowledge it and let’s just move on.
It’s funny. It’s classic Seinfeld. It’s also ironic that a guy who made a billion dollars from a show based on meaningless conversations is trashing meaningless conversations. Obviously, he loves meaningless conversations.
I do, too. And so should you and I’ll tell you why with examples in a second.
The problem right now is that in our modern society it’s way too easy to avoid people and we’re losing the art of the random exchange; the serendipitous moments that happen when you chat with a stranger.
Instead, we avoid interaction at all costs: earbuds everywhere, heads buried in phones, nobody looking up, nobody smiling, nobody striking up conversations anymore. Everyone lives in their own entertainment ecosystem of podcasts and music and social media and scrolling while doing just about everything.
God forbid you’re waiting somewhere for more than eleven seconds and you have to be alone with your thoughts or chat up the nice old lady behind you. No. We can’t have that.
Instead, people live in their own heads all day in public and I’m telling you, you’re missing out. Talking to people is a good thing, not a distraction or a waste of time. You never know what great story you’ll hear or interesting person you’ll meet or what tip you’ll get that will help you out.
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In the last few weeks alone, I’ve had small talk lead to some cool stuff.
Example 1:
I was going for a jog with my daughter around the lake in our neighborhood on Saturday morning. I saw a guy fishing with two little kids. He had all kinds of gear laid out in his truck bed near the water. I could tell he knew his shit. I live on the other side of the lake and fish a decent amount. Unfortunately, we’ve got a problem with an invasive species called a bullseye snakehead (looks like a nasty freshwater barracuda) that has been demolishing the bass and bluegill population in the lake. You used to catch at least six or seven bass if you cast for an hour but since last summer you catch nothing… or you catch a heavy-ass snakehead and they snap your line unless it’s double braided at least.
Anyway, I was curious if he caught anything so I jogged over. How’s it going? Catch anything? Any snakeheads? You know: small talk.
We chatted for a bit and he told me about a canal a few miles away that was protected from the snakeheads so far and where he’s had a ton of success. So I took my son there that evening and we pulled out plenty of fish. It was a great tip.
All because of small talk. All because of two words to a stranger: “Catch anything?”
Example 2:
I was in line with my son at the grocery store. Despite my best efforts at getting him to appreciate legitimately good pizza, he loves stuffed crust DiGiorno. I don’t get it, but if you ask him, he’ll say those mass produced, flash frozen meat and cheese gut bombs are better than any pizza in the world.
While we were in line, a dad in cargo shorts, a Salt Life shirt and flip flops pulled in behind us with his cart and his two sons and I noticed that they also had several frozen pizzas in their cart (different brand, I don’t remember which one).
I should mention here that I’ve made it a point lately not to take out my phone when I’m bored anymore. I hate it. I feel like a zombie. I want to be present when I’m out and about and this time it paid off.
The Salt Life guy looked in my cart and saw the DiGiorno pizza and smirked.
“Your son, too?” he said.
“Yeah,” I said. “I don’t get it. DiGiorno is fine. A C+ if you’re craving pizza. But my kid thinks it’s better than anything ever made in New York or Chicago or wherever.”
Then the guy asked if I’d tried this pizza place I hadn’t heard of. It was about 20 minutes away, but he swore it was worth it. He was from Long Island, but said this was the best pizza he’s had in a decade of living in Florida.
So a few days later we went. And it was awesome. Great recommendation.
My point: In both of the situations above, I could have jogged past the fishing guy and just nodded and I could have taken my phone out in the grocery store and scrolled to not make eye contact or talk to anyone.
And if I did that, I’d still be striking out with fish in the lake closest to us and I’d never know about a great pizza spot.
Are these small things?
Yeah, of course. But they’re cool. And useful. And you feel a little more connected.
Hell, I’ll trust an in-person pizza recommendation from a guy from New York who also hates frozen pizza over anything I read on Yelp. And I’ll trust a new fishing spot rec from a guy who’s actually fishing in my neighborhood over any reddit board or chat room.
Turns out, small talk isn’t meaningless. It’s meaningful.
Give it a shot, even if it’s been a while.
Trust me. It’s worth it.
P.S. ONE IMPORTANT NOTE: When I refer to “small talk” I don’t mean forcing conversation with regular secondary characters in your life who are annoying. Secondary characters are people you see on a regular basis because of proximity or routine: the neighbor you can’t stand, the annoying guy at the gym, whoever.
These are people you have established a negative rapport with. You’re forced to see them and that’s life, but you don’t want to prolong any interaction. They suck, basically. Totally understandable to avoid them.
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Jon Finkel
Editor-in-Chief, Midlife Male
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