I have never been that great at saying the appropriate things in awkward situations.
I'd go so far to say that if anything terrible should happen to anyone I knew, that I should not be allowed to speak. that someone should lock me in a room and clamp my moth shut. Like so many people, I just don't know what to say or do and so I babble and say the first thing that comes into my head. I just feel so awful, and being a pretty blunt person my inappropriate replies just sound like direct insults.
For example, a good friend of mine told me yesterday that his grandfather had died after a long battle with Alzheimer's. I felt really bad for him, but wasn't quite sure what to say and so I tried to console him with a "I'm really sorry" and a "That's terrible." But after a while I ran out of comforting things to say, and I suddenly made the connection that it was his mother's father who'd died. I asked him, knowing her mother had died some years previous, and my friend nodded...Yes it was her father who'd died.
What did I have to say in return?
"Oh. So, I guess your Mum's an orphan now, huh?"
Stunned silence ensued.
The ground never swallows you whole when you want it to.
1 comment:
I'm not inviolved in this story in any way.... you disgust me! Frankly I don't know how you sleep at night, you make my soul bleed and angels cry.
I feel so bad for your 'good friend' he sounds like such a great guy, the sort of person who is just awesome and should never be taken for granted. In fact Dan is just amazing!... oh crap you never mentioned his name... um I mean... he sounds like he would have an awesome name like Dan... :D
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