For Veteran's Day
Today's poem on Wondering Minstrels, by Wendell Berry:

'Untitled'

    To my granddaughters who visited the Holocaust Museum
    on the day of the burial of Yitzak Rabin, November 6th 1995.

Now you know the worst
we humans have to know
about ourselves, and I am sorry,

for I know you will be afraid.
To those of our bodies given
without pity to be burned, I know

there is no answer
but loving one another
even our enemies, and this is hard.

But remember:
when a man of war becomes a man of peace,
he gives a light, divine

though it is also human.
When a man of peace is killed
by a man of war, he gives a light.

You do not have to walk in darkness.
If you have the courage for love,
you may walk in light. It will be

the light of those who have suffered
for peace. It will be
your light.

     -- Wendell Berry
     from: A Timbered Choir, The Sabbath Poems 1979-1997

5:05:50 PM      trackback [] 

Uncivil liberties

Yesterday’s Boston Globe had a piece on the return of public rudeness after a grace period following 9/11. I had been thinking about this recently. I was in my local grocery store and inadvertently stepped on a woman’s heels. I apologized profusely, but she gave me a look like I’d just murdered her first born and she stormed off. In the Globe article, Rosanne J. Thomas, founder of Boston’s Protocol Advisors, says that people often make too big a deal over inadvertent things:

Unfortunately, there's a lapse in etiquette when people make too great a deal over things that are inadvertent, offenses that they perceive as being intentional but really are inadvertent oversights. In etiquette, we want to overlook as much as we can. Not everything, of course, but we try to give other people the benefit of the doubt.

I have a friend who I’ve seen light into people who inadvertently crossed her. Once she told off a woman who expressed her good opinion of a book my friend was looking at in a bookstore. The woman looked like she’d been slapped. I was mortified. I had no idea what to do.

It’s been pointed out that civility is an issue in the blogoshere, particularly in political blogs. In September, Calpundit called for “a civil discussion that doesn't involve kindergarten levels of invective and personal attacks.” Can’t we all just get along?

Rosanne Thomas says manners declined after families stopped eating together at the dinner table, where “manners were reinforced all the time -- conversation, listening skills, dining skills, basic considerations, and even electronic manners in that you didn't take telephone calls during the meal.” She’s optimistic that it’s never too late to learn good manners. Her company offers remedial training.

Have an etiquette question?

- Netiquette offers do’s and don’ts for online communication.

- Check out www.etiquettehell.com for 100s of examples of bad behavior!

- Etiquette Grrls provides this primer for your upcoming Thanksgiving Dinner.

- The Morning News has a fun piece on dating etiquette (see also the companion piece on kindness).

- Finally, here's a good assortment of etiquette articles, from cocktail parties to karaoke (I kid you not).

10:00:19 AM      trackback []