My parents are down visiting for the weekend, although their first priority isn’t to see me. Dad was invited to talk on the panel for a conference at James Madison College, given that he’s now a big powerful lawyer and thus a successful JMC alum. The conference was all day today, so I didn’t really get to see them too much — that’s what tomorrow’s for. But I was invited to attend the luncheon with them anyway.

It was about as formal and professional as you can imagine. I did feel special and important, though: because Dad was on the panel, he was seated at the reserved table front and center. So the family sat with him. At the special reserved table. Ooooh.

I was introduced to a lot of people who seemed equally important and, well, intimidating. There was a man who was working in political PR in North Carolina, and the associate dean of James Madison (!). I also was introduced to a college buddy of Dad’s and his wife, both practicing law somewhere else. We spent some time making small talk — they asked me if I was a student, what my major is, how I’m enjoying school, blah blah blah. There’d be periods of silence, too, in which we all avoided each other’s gaze and kind of awkwardly gazed around at various areas in the room.

At first, I kind of wondered if it was my fault. It’s always difficult to make conversation with someone significantly older than you — the generation gap kind of makes it hard to find things in common to talk about. Not to mention the fact that I’m not in JMC, so I can’t talk about political science or law with any of these people. So I felt a little guilty until I glanced at my parents on either side of me and realized they were participating in the exact same kind of awkward, disjointed conversation.

Today I learned that everyone is bad at small talk, but it’s a pretty essential part of life. Even the associate dean of JMC wasn’t talking fluidly and charismatically with everyone, always. We’re always expected to be able to talk, and if people are sitting in silence, something or someone is wrong. But isn’t silence just the other half of conversation? Awkward pauses in conversation happen to everyone, so you can’t feel guilty or blame yourself.

Networking is excessively helpful. One of the graduating students at our table was asking me about my major, and when I informed her I was in journalism, she told me about a world-famous professor who teaches a specific class. Networking like that can get you great leads or great contacts that will serve you extremely well in the future. I certainly know what class I’m going to be signing up for as soon as possible. So making the awkward small talk, no matter how awkward, is still a good idea.

I think the best you can do is just practice. The more you force yourself out of your comfort zone, the more comfortable you become in doing so (paradoxically enough). So while you may never prefer chit-chatting with strangers over a conversation with your buds, eventually you’ll get to the point where you don’t freeze up around strangers. And it’s really important to recognize that everyone struggles with it. I thought I might be embarrassing my parents by not socializing well enough, but it turns out they were right there in the same boat with me.

Never hurt to do a little research and pick up some tips, though. You’ll find all sorts of lists of ideas and reccomendations on Google, but this one is particularly good. Happy reading!