You really want to know, don't you? Some people have suggested anthropophobia, my own mother and brother just yesterday made the serious and disturbing suggestion that I had some form of undiagnosed autism (which I found utterly ridiculous). My dad was closer on the mark last week when he said that I seemed to be "retreating into myself". I call it extreme shyness. It takes a herculean will on my part to initiate or maintain a conversation with all but my closest allies, and even then I have a tendency to wander off by myself.