Small Talk Among Friends

In participating in this blog, I have discovered that most of my life is filled with small talk. At least 90% of the conversations I have during a normal day are with my friends and they usually are about the same stuff. This morning we all went to Family Breakfast and discussed the events from the night before. We do this every Saturday and Sunday and it’s always a lot of fun. About a dozen of my close friends and I all sit at a round table in the dining hall and talk about the past week, the night before, and what we all want to do later on. It’s almost always a pleasant and friendly atmosphere and our discussions are different in content but the same in intentions. We all try to learn about each other and get estimations on how the night went for everybody. If someone had a bad night we might pick on them for it, but then we offer advice for them to help them future. We are an unorthodox, squabbling, happy family and our small talk around the breakfast table reflects that.

When we have our group conversations everyone is entitled to express their opinion. The right to voice your own ideas and opinions are part of the social norms we unconsciously implement among ourselves. However, another social norm is that others in the group can interrupt, mock, or disregard whatever you want to say. This makes the conversations hard to follow at times, but it also makes the discussions we have more lively and we are all a lot more enthusiastic. We talk in a casual and very informal tone about anything we want because we are all comfortable with each other.

We all are from the New England area but some of us still sound different. One of my friends is from Melrose near Boston, Massachusetts so his speech has a very distinct accent. Another friend from Long Island uses words that I usually wouldn’t and talks with a slight Long Island accent. We hardly notice the differences anymore, but at first their speech seemed very peculiar to me. No matter what we discuss, what accents we use, or where we talk the conversations are always meant to be positive and most importantly they are always with friends.



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