When you hear the same thing said about you by multiple people, I suppose it counts as an accurate assessment of your personality. The thing I hear is rather an odd one: “You’re never bored, are you?” I’m not entirely sure it’s always meant as a compliment, and I’ve heard it in a variety of settings, from a variety of people. And it’s actually true. I don’t even understand boredom. The closest I come is when there’s something I need to do that I don’t want to do, but I don’t want to let myself do anything fun instead because then I’ll never get around to it. I actually deliberately try to create a state of boredom to force myself into doing the thing I need to do, for lack of anything better to do. Sometimes I’m paralyzed by indecision about what, exactly, I want to do, but I don’t know that I ever really feel like there’s nothing to do.

I’m more likely to have way more things I want to do than I have time to do. There are books to read, stuff on TV to watch, musical instruments to play, music to listen to, things to sew or knit, gardening, writing, cooking, even housework and organizing. And that’s without leaving the house. Last weekend, I had a list of things I wanted to do and barely got to half of them.

I don’t even need stuff like books or a TV around to amuse myself. I can just sit and think and be entertained. I dream up stories in my head, make plans, analyze things, write mental essays. I can replay stories I’ve read or watched and spin off new ideas based on that. I actually like thinking so much that most of my efforts at meditating have failed because my brain sees just sitting still as playtime. I’ve learned to go to bed early to give myself time to lie and think before I go to sleep.

I was thinking about this when talking to friends last week. We went around the group on the Zoom call, talking about how we were coping with the lockdown. One friend mentioned that she was so bored that she’s been doing laundry every day just to have something to do. Then I started mentioning the list of things I’ve been doing and how I’ve been enjoying having time to do them all. That was when I heard it again: “You’re never bored, are you?” I’ve been reading a lot, listening to concerts on the classical radio station, writing, studying Norwegian, trying new recipes, watching theater online, organizing my house, and gardening. I haven’t gotten around to playing much music or singing, so my voice is out of shape. I’ve thought about doing more sewing, and I haven’t done a knitting project in months because I don’t have the yarn for what I want to do and I haven’t gone shopping for it.

I think I learned to amuse myself at an early age because I was an only child until I was six, and there weren’t a lot of other kids my age in the neighborhood. Then even after my brother was born, it was a few years because he was interesting to play with. I had all kinds of games I played alone, mostly involving making up stories and acting them out. Since we moved a lot, I was frequently the new kid, and there was always a phase before I made friends, so I had to work on my self-entertainment skills.

I don’t know if all this led to me being a writer, or if it was me having the aptitude for writing that made me able to cope like this. When you can make up stories, you don’t ever have to be bored.