Believe Strangers

Why is it we believe complete strangers and not our family?

It is a question that has been plaguing me for a long time. We give our honest and admittedly, sometimes brutal opinions to the people closest to us, expecting them to take it to heart. Why? Because we always, most of the time, regularly, usually try to give the correct guidance to the ones we love. That's why it's so frustrating to have that sage advice rejected almost out of hand. You know that you're right, yet your spouse/child/parent can't see it. I can almost see the foot stomping happening right now.

Take that same advice and give it to someone you meet on the bus. Then get that stranger to casually meet your family member on another bus or in a park.

Wherever they can. See what happens as the conversation progresses with the stranger passing on the same advice you tried to pass on. Ten to one, your target, er, family member will comeback and take it as gospel that this person on the bus has the greatest advice ever and they are taking it lock, stock and barrel.

Here is a for instance: a person I know works shift work. They will remain nameless, to protect the writer (who can't run as fast as he used to). This person was trying to convince their spouse that shift work does really, really weird things to their mind and there are certain things that you shouldn't ask the shift worker to do on their first day off. Like take the mail to the Post Office, or tie the kids shoes up for them. After every rotation, the shift worker would have to explain this the spouse, who frankly, did not believe a word.

Flash forward to a few weeks later and the couple are sitting with another friend who also works shifts. As the lunch progresses, the friend regales the couple with stories of how she can't function for the first day off, because she had worked so many nights in a row. The spouse looks to the shift working partner and says "Have you heard of this? This is amazing - you should listen to this." I have never seen salad chewed so thoroughly in my life.

Now take me for instance. I have been writing the obligatory Christmas letter for years now. Several years ago, I had had it up to here with the boiler-plate format - you know, kids are this tall, we went to Camp Fun-A-Lot for two weeks, the dog had hairballs and the cat had puppies, and so on.

I started to rebel. I chose to add in my opinions, weird factoids, and general topics that I had some interest in and sent it off to family and a few close friends. Lo and behold, the relatives came back with glowing reviews and a request for more letters, sent more often. I kept them wanting, only sending out one, maybe two letters a year. I figured they were being nice to me because they had to - they were family. As for the friends that were fans, well, I usually have beer in the fridge and a good supply of steaks. I figured they didn't want the trough to dry up.

Finally I met a lady who is a travel writer, who read my letters and laid it out to me. She said I should write more, for more people. I had to take her seriously; she writes for a living (and does a great job of it!) and well, here I am. I hope you enjoy my missives, and if you don't, remember, I am a stranger and you have to believe me.