When we were eating, family style with 8 other people, at Mrs. Wilkes Boarding House in Savannah, one of the gentlemen was talking about a trip he had taken recently and concluded his story with "Yup, you meet good people wherever you go." And his statement kind of knocked me on my ass. He just seemed so... convinced. It was his unquestionable world view that, obviously, you'll meet good people wherever you go.
And call me a product of a cranky New England upbringing, but I have never once thought that. I know perfectly well that there ARE good people wherever you go, but I've never been convinced of it in such a particular way as that man was. He fully expected to meet really good people wherever he went.
I fully expect to meet ignorant or distant or rude people wherever I go. Yikes. And the thing is, I've never heard any friend or family member or stranger express the sentiment that he did. So I think, unfortunately, that my assumptions are more common than his.
But I'd like to hear from you - when you go out into the world, do you assume you're on your way to meet good people or do you assume you're gonna encounter some assholes?
Tell me in the comments.
6 comments:
It seems like whenever Matt and I go on vacation or go away somewhere we always meet good people. In most cases we end up at the hotel bar at some point to watch whatever sporting event is on tv. Matt being the person that he is always ends up talking to other bar patrons who end up being really nice people. I don't think we've ever come across someone who isn't friendly.
I'm not posting anymore comments. I just wrote a BOOK in response to this and Blogger lost it. It did the same thing to me on L's blog a couple of days ago. FURIOUS! I'm done.
Definitely good people. Perhaps it's because so much of our traveling is music-related & the people always seem so happy to be there. But I think I expect most people to be kind each other, because whenever I DO encounter the occasional jerk, I'm just so shocked, I really don't know how to respond. The exception is driving. The sense of entitlement people display while driving (especially around here), is infuriatingly widespread.
I'm really surprised to hear you say that because you seem to have such a positive outlook on life in general. I generally think you can meet good people wherever you go, but that doesn't necessarily mean I'm going to be their best friend and want to share every minute of my life with them (that's my NY upbringing shining through!)I've had a fairly lucky life so far where I've had the opportunity to be in some pretty good places; I don't know if I would feel the same way if life was harder.
Maybe I didn't do quite a good enough job of explaining myself, or maybe I just really am grumpy than other people when it comes to strangers ;)
I'm never surprised when I meet nice people, but I also not quite as convinced of people's goodness as that man was.
I think when it comes to strangers I'm just naturally suspicious. Not of anything horrible, I don't think they're out to hurt me, I'm just suspicious that they would actually turn out to be someone I wanted to meet.
Not to sound wishy-washy, but I expect both. I assume that generally people are good, but I try not to be surprised when they turn out to be assholes.
I feel I HAVE to believe there are more good people than bad out there. Otherwise, the bad people win out.
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