A New Experience - Blogging

Who wants to read about what happens in my life?

That's not my purpose here.  I want to address some life topics that I feel should be addressed in everyone's life.

Let's take greetings for example.  I work in a place where the majority of the population, regardless of position, rarely lift their eyes from the floor while walking to greet someone coming along opposite them.  Now, I did an experiment:  I spent two whole days trying to see if a little extra effort on my part would elicit a greeting from these floor-watchers.  The results?  No matter how loudly or friendly I greeted, several of my "targets" actually did not respond or even looked away!

Didn't their parents ever teach them anything?  My father, always told me that when you walk into a room, it is your responsibility (not the people already in the room) to greet everyone.  In our Italian family, that meant going around to every single person and giving the required kiss (which usually ended up being cheek-to-cheek touching with a lip-smacking sound) hello before you could even take your coat off.  Familial wars have been fought due to a lack of greeting!  So I am acutely aware of the responsibility to say hello when confronted by another human being.  (I'm not sure of the requirement when it comes to fuzzy creatures, though I've never seen a family member hesitate to pat the dog!)

I tried racking my brain to think of reasons why the above-mentioned floor-watchers do not respond to a friendly greeting.  Ok, so maybe some are having bad days and maybe some are shy, but that can't possibly account for everyone that walks past me without saying hello back.  I'm not a person who people normally avoid due to physical looks or anything, so it's not that.  Why might these people not say hello in response to my greeting?  Perhaps they like the perception that they are too busy or too upset or whatnot.  Or maybe they just don't know what to say.

Well, you must be wondering at this point why I stopped my experiment after only two days.  It was just too diappointing when people whom I greeted with a big smile and a "Good morning!" did not respond at all!  I couldn't keep beating a dead horse, or however that saying goes.  Instead I think about the good feelings I get when someone greets me back, or even greets me first, and I focus on those people.  That's not to say that I don't greet the floor-watchers anymore, but I don't take it to heart when they don't respond.  And I think about how I'm going to teach my future children as my parents taught me:  Go around the room and say hello to everyone.  And when you leave, go around and say goodbye to everyone.  It's polite.