Conversation starters - need help

I should add we went out with neighbours last week (rare event) and we were out for 3 hours so we can do it - just not on our own.

Re dinner, when staying in hotels we often take our books down to dinner. Conversation can be much easier somehow if sitting diagonally from one another, rather than face to face.

My late husband and I used to chat about the day we’d had or if on holiday about where we’d been and seen or plan the next day. Talking about mundane things often led to something completely different or to reminiscing about the past.

There are conversation books, maybe more for business settings. I will look them out sometime later.

There is a game which is a conversation starter. Maybe more for older people. Again, I will look it up later[I am out today].

I always sit next to DH at a meal, if I can. I never did like the sitting opposite. He used to find it odd, years ago, but has got used to it now.

Go and see a play or a film which is thought-provoking and discuss it afterwards. It might help to start with a subject not directly related to yourselves

We often sit in silence for ages. After 47 years what is there left to say except daily arrangements. However it's not uncomfortable. Often you are communicating when you're not actually speaking.

We used to read aloud to each other and talk about the novel. Now we use Borrowbox and it talks to both of us. We chat about it.

We chat about the news, politics, family, food, its provenance, why some things are nicer/better/shiny/flat/unpleasant or whatever. Which lamp we like (and why), wallpaper, gardening, other people... We share our thoughts pretty much all the time. We disagree about things ...

We share things we have just found out - the history of a particular spice, the pronunciation of a word, where cobalt comes from...
I think you just need to talk and then you will have more to talk about.

What did you talk about with your friends?

PS - we can do a happy silence too!

I think the problem is in the fact you have no hobbies. My late husband and I had no trouble chatting but we did have hobbies, not always things we did together either. He enjoyed clay pigeon shooting so when he got home we would chat about his score, the people he’d met etc. My hobby is crafting and he sometimes helped if I got stuck, eventually doing some crafting himself when his health problems made him slow down.
Like you, we had few friends, most having died or moved away over the years but we needed no-one else.
If you have family, you could both write your life stories to pass down. Our children asked us to do that so they could see what our lives were like before they were born.

I have an itinerary!
So many couples sit in silence and I determined we wouldn’t. My DH is also quiet so if we are going out by ourselves I ‘save’ my incredibly interesting bits and pieces till we get there.

My DH is a bit rubbish at both conversation and debates! He takes any different views very personally (only from me haha)

However we do often socialise with some very close friends and he’s very chatty with the husbands about sport, current affairs, the weather and I’m left happily to chit chat with my girlie friends.

It works for us! We do watch a lot of TV together and enjoy that and go to the theatre as often as we can He just doesn’t really do “small talk”

What is "small talk" though Cossy? How do you define it?

Surely ^sport, current affairs and weather - is probably "small talk".

Why is what you chat with to your friends not "small talk"?

In my mind, "small talk" is stuff I might discuss in the gaps in a business meeting that reveals nothing much of me. I wouldn't talk "small talk" to my husband.
I think I'm maybe just not understanding what you mean Cossy, sorry.

My late DH and I never stopped talking and laughing. We'd talk about politics, spirituality, world affairs, things that had amused us, our mutual love of animals and wildlife. We'd analyse a film or TV show we'd watched together or a book we'd read or we'd talk about music. We'd drift down memory lane drawing from our own shared history or from our respective lives before we met. Sometimes we'd do a general knowledge quiz together and the winner got a glass of wine. We'd sometimes manage to squeeze in mundane stuff too!

We didn't have any hobbies or friends as such but we really didn't need it. There never seemed to be enough time together.

We had a lot in common and shared more or less the same fundamental views on life/society although with enough difference to make for some interesting debates. We also shared a very similar sense of humour and there was a lot of laughter and silliness in our home. We were married for 26 years until his sudden death.

Can I ask what attracted you to your partner, enough to want to live with him? There must be some commonality. Did the neighbours "carry" the conversation or did your husband talk to the man about cars all evening and you to the woman about cooking (or whatever). Was it really a four way conversation?

We are among those who will talk about anything and everything. In a restaraurant; the decor, other diners, the staff, other restaurantsw we have been in, food memories.

I think that possible what you need to do is learn how to expand conversations. So if in a restaurant, sitting in a window table, you notice something and one says 'Oh look, at that car/person/shop window, and why' The response isn't 'Yes'. but 'Yes, and do you remember when we saw that other car/person/shop window when we were on holiday and you ......'

The art is to make a respnse and expand it and leave it open. I think there are a lot of people to whom conversation doesn't come naturally and they need to practice. Think back to that meal with friends and how and why you could converse there - what were your friends doing or saying that opened conversation up? Then start practicing, say for 5 or 10 minutes, possibly when you relax over your after lunch coffee or similar.

I confess, coming from a family of non-stop talkers I once sat fascinated in a retaurant able to see a family of parents, young teenage son and grandmother as they sat for 45 minutes, without phones and didn't exchange a single word that didn't directly relate to ordering their food and eating it.

NotSpaghetti

What is "small talk" though Cossy? How do you define it?

Surely ^sport, current affairs and weather - is probably "small talk".

Why is what you chat with to your friends not "small talk"?

Oh I definitely “small talk” and like to, my DHs definition of small talk, is basically anything he considers unimportant and anything in which he’s not interested! I think we all have our own definition of this.

We talk about sport, politics, my children, our grandchildren, weekend/holiday plans, jobs to do about the house or garden, the food we’re eating, all sorts. When we both worked, it was rather a rushed catch up time, now, although I’m retired, MrJ p/t, we still have indépendant interests, if not actual hobbies.
Sometimes if we’re outside people watching we invent, or surmise about other people there in a kind way, it makes us laugh.

We are generally a noisy, chatty family, especially when we all get together, it’s just my husband who doesn’t appreciate the non-stop banter from all our family members, male or female!

Years ago an obnoxious aunt once told me, ‘Your husband never talks to me’. I responded by saying he never talks to me either, what makes you so special!

axjacky

“We talk about sport, politics, my children, our grandchildren, weekend/holiday plans, jobs to do about the house or garden, the food we’re eating, all sorts. When we both worked, it was rather a rushed catch up time, now, although I’m retired, MrJ p/t, we still have indépendant interests, if not actual hobbies.
Sometimes if we’re outside people watching we invent, or surmise about other people there in a kind way, it makes us laugh.”

People watching my favourite hobby 😂😂😂😂😂 occasionally my DH will join in, but if I’m out with close girlie friends we do this all the time, inventing all kinds of different, often very unlikely, scenarios.

Polar22 maybe you need to "think aloud" more - and encourage him to join in.

"I wonder if this room would look better with...
"Mmmn,what colour flowers would go nicely in this space
"Why do some people...
"I wonder what it would be like to...
"It must be terrible to have to....

We have lots of thoughts we vocalise and share...
I wonder why X thought Y,
I wonder what P will do now ...
Why do you think lemon goes so well with fish..

Maybe we are just too much in each other's heads!
We are always interested in each other (except sometimes football (for me) or my super-detailed explanations of things (him)!
🤣

Sometimes when out together we are quiet because we are actually earwigging!
Once we found out a massive amount about two families seated together at a motorway service station. Interestingly we were listening mainly to different people and put the story together over the rest of the drive home!

Thank you for all the comments. Ive thought about this a lot. I honestly think we got together because neither of us wanted to be on our own. Very sad I know and maybe a bad decision but 10 years later and we’re still here and I think we’ve learnt to love each other. We both worked at first and he had a hobby which took him out a lot so time together was limited. Lack of conversation wasn’t an issue. Now we’re retired and his hobby ended (too complicated to explain). When we do go out with others I talk a lot (I think) and the other people do too. He joins in a bit but he’s got a habit of saying things that bring conversations to an end. He is a really bad communicator and he admits it. He wishes he could be better which is why I’m looking for a ‘learning tool’. He does have low level ADHD which again he knows. Give him a car conversation or buildings and he won’t shut up - to the point of people glazing over. Again he acknowledges this. We’ve talked a bit about this issue. I start a conversation and he shuts me down by talking about something he knows. What I call ‘black catting’ I.e. if you’ve seen a black cat he’s seen one bigger and blacker. I don’t want to leave. We’re doing ok. But I’d love to go out with him and spend more than an hour before we head home - because I guess we’re both bored. Ooh this is awful as I’m writing I’m depressing myself!!!! I suspect we bore each other……..

Oh and he’s a bit deaf so I have to repeat EVERYTHING which drives me bats. And then he looks at me and shrugs. ….. aargh

Polar22 could you start a conversation by asking him why he thinks you both are quieter than others around you?
Or asking him if he would like or mind if you tried to up the level of conversation?
You may find he is just wanting someone to start the ball rolling. In which case he will be a willing victim.
But should he prefer things to stay the way they are, it may save you from a lot of heart ache trying to force the issue.

Once you understand more fully how you both feel, you can proceed anyway you think fit.

Good luck