Monday 4 May 2009

Sunday 3rd May 2009 – Playing Second Fiddle

It's hard to be the centre of attention at a funeral.  Unless you're a small child.  Which I try to pretend I'm not.  So it's an occasion for mature behaviour: listening to other people, being polite, stuff like that.

I had occasion to go up to "The Lakes", a couple of hundred miles north.  Minnesota car plates say "10,000 Lakes" on them.  The northern half of the state is made of water, and the roads skirt carefully through it.  The occasion, unfortunately, was a funeral. But it gave me the opportunity to visit "The Lakes", and also to check out my new satellite navigation system.

The deceased, who was, as is the custom here, on open display, had been the school principal, and elected County Commissioner.  He was definitely very popular.  People had come a long way to pay their respects.

The necessity of behaving maturely, and listening politely provided a useful lesson: how to achieve this level of popularity.  Obviously, one way is to die: everyone speaks well of the dead.  But apparently this man liked everyone.  As a result, they thought he was wonderful: "The first thing he always said to you was a compliment".

So if you want people to think highly of you, you have to tell them how highly you think of them.  Tough stuff, eh?

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