Old people; New friends

Making friends is an important part of human development, human experience and ultimately human happiness. It begins in very early childhood. Some children are born with personalities that are naturally gregarious, and other children suffer shyness from a very early age. In most cases children outgrow their shyness, but sometimes it lingers into adolescence and even into a lifelong impediment to making friends.

New parents and grandparents, who joyfully cannot keep their eyes off the new arrival, search for hints of personality. They do so only after making claim (wishful thinking) that the ch...