We sat next to each other in the waiting area, the stranger and I, chatting about the weather, the traffic, life in general as we passed the time until it was our respective turns. People came and went, some within hearing range, others buried in their magazines or their fancy phones that do everything but, well, they do everything, don't they?
Time passed, we talked some more, and then the topic turned to one of my hot button issues. Oops. I jumped on that bandwagon as it chugged on by us there in that waiting room, others joining in as their cages were rattled, too. It's a huge issue in our city, as well as all over the country, and it's like tossing a match onto a kerosene-soaked rag in your garage. You'd better stand back or you'll get the eyebrows singed right off your face.
I've learned some things as my decades have slipped by like flood waters under a door, though. My rant stopped short of naming names in our town, those misguided folks who I feel are the cause of the problems....or at least, they don't understand the problems they were hired to fix so just manage to make things worse. With our money. (I'm not going to name the problem, if you're skimming ahead to nail it down. Too many people know me in this town.)
But to return to what I've learned, I hope younger people are reading this and save themselves some huge embarrassment along the way. Here it is:
You never know who you're talking to.
That happened to me once. I ranted and raved about [insert name] and found out later that the person I was ranting TO was related to the person I was ranting ABOUT. I had no idea. And I had no way of knowing that, either, at the time. Not until it was too late.
Ouch.
So, I zipped it there in that waiting room before I fell off that particular cliff again. And sure enough, I later found out that the woman WAS related to one of the people I was tirading about.
Whew! I avoided the precipice and lived to rant another day.
Time passed, we talked some more, and then the topic turned to one of my hot button issues. Oops. I jumped on that bandwagon as it chugged on by us there in that waiting room, others joining in as their cages were rattled, too. It's a huge issue in our city, as well as all over the country, and it's like tossing a match onto a kerosene-soaked rag in your garage. You'd better stand back or you'll get the eyebrows singed right off your face.
I've learned some things as my decades have slipped by like flood waters under a door, though. My rant stopped short of naming names in our town, those misguided folks who I feel are the cause of the problems....or at least, they don't understand the problems they were hired to fix so just manage to make things worse. With our money. (I'm not going to name the problem, if you're skimming ahead to nail it down. Too many people know me in this town.)
But to return to what I've learned, I hope younger people are reading this and save themselves some huge embarrassment along the way. Here it is:
You never know who you're talking to.
That happened to me once. I ranted and raved about [insert name] and found out later that the person I was ranting TO was related to the person I was ranting ABOUT. I had no idea. And I had no way of knowing that, either, at the time. Not until it was too late.
Ouch.
So, I zipped it there in that waiting room before I fell off that particular cliff again. And sure enough, I later found out that the woman WAS related to one of the people I was tirading about.
Whew! I avoided the precipice and lived to rant another day.
I like restraint, if it doesn't go too far.
Mae West
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