Foot In Mouth Disease

Tact: noun, a keen sense of what to say or do to avoid giving offense; skill in dealing with difficult or delicate situations.

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I either enjoy social situation or tire of them quickly. If people at a gathering get on my nerves, then most times I drift away, quietly. A lot of the time my BS detectors will be ringing like Big Ben to someone's horseshit and I'll get tired of that. I'll open my mouth and say what everyone else is thinking. I can't help it, my cup runneth over and I have to say something.

Then there's that complete silence as if I just spit in someone's dinner plate at a restaurant.

I hate to admit but I've learned a trick from the Millennial's. I'm not sure if they're X, Y or the Z generation but it's a handy ploy. Today's kids take “ditching” to a new level. If you don't want to hang around someone, you just leave, right then and there w/o any explanation. You just turn and walk away.

If someone is boring the shit out of me, I'll just turn to the next person and start a conversation there. Yep, I'm losing my Edwardian etiquette. Is it rude? Yes. But God as my witness, listening to some one who is just prattling on about a subject I care nothing about, starts create real pain in me. My younger self would've grinned and bear it but not anymore.

“Oh God, Shut Up! Shut Up! Shut Up!” I can hear my brain screaming.

As for opening my mouth and dropping truths onto people's feet like 20lb dumbells, well...yeah, it's true. I do do that on occasion.

A while back, while at the Carousel Bar and Grill, I watched as a young girl was trying to shove $8 dollars worth of quarters into a cigarette machine. She wasn't having much luck and finally her fist load of coins spilled onto the tile floor, scattering and rolling all around.

I was sitting, with my feet up on another chair, sipping my beer when I saw this and started laughing. Out of nowhere, her friend, who I think was about 21, comes right at me and admonishes me.

“You think that's funny? You always laugh at people's mistakes? Who the hell are you?” she barks

“Hey, honey...Don't be upset” I say. “Everyone gets their balls busted, hers, yours and mine, we all are the butt of jokes. Everyone laughs at you and me till the day we die.”

“WHHATTTT!” she yells at me. I guess the truth wasn't the right route, but I didn't care then either.

I sense where this will lead and I start to turn away from her and say;

“Oh look, I'm not getting into a screamfest with a 20-something.”

“YOU SON OF A BITCH! I OUGHTA GET MY BOYFRIEND TO KICK YOUR ASS!”

Meanwhile, the 40 something guys I was hanging with departed in eight different directions. Thanks guys.

I sipped my beer and saw how red faced this chick was. She finally went over to help her friend and I sat there, finishing the chips and beer and leaned back in my chair, caring not one iota for what just happened.

I was actually very calm even with the threat of her boyfriend, who may have been in the joint too. I didn't care. So I sez to myself;

“Go ahead and get your boyfriend and I'll expose your entire relationship from what I have learned about you already (and you've shown me ALOT) to everyone here. It might be worth the bloody nose.”

I was in that mood again. I'm not taking any BS nor am I varnishing the truth tonight. I was tired of tip toeing around eggshells.

I met my friends out in the parking lot as they hadn't left yet or decided where to go. Bill, then looks at me and says; “Man, I can't believe you said that to her...no wonder she was pissed!”

My reply was typical me if in that character. “Oh for God's sake...I really didn't want to get into an argument with someone 20 years my junior...I wasn't in the mood at all for having to explain myself as I didn't feel the whole episode was worth it. So I just told her, that's it, end of conversation.”

I swear, there are times when I just get tired of having to be socially adept, socially acceptable, socially correct; of having to test the waters and say the “right thing.” There's a switch in me that clicks OFF and I won't notice it happening and watch out, I'll say what's right on my mind. God, how I LOVE my independence. I've been throwing conformity into the gutter since I was a kid, when it suited me to do so.

Oh, by the way..what's good for them is good for me. I have told people who know me well enough they can throw any barbs at me as they wish if I happen to be that zone. Go right ahead. If I dump the truth in your lap, you can dump it mine.

But most times, I can be as gracious as butler. No joke, ask around, people will tell you. I haven't completely lost my upbringing, yet.