A Closer Look

My friends and I sometimes play a game called "Loaded Questions". In this game, one person reads a question and everyone else writes a responce to it. Then, someone collects and reads them all, and the person who asked the question has to guess who wrote what. Try it at home or even on a camping trip - it's fun! One time, the question was "What do you believe?" I remember my answer being: "I believe that everyone deserves a closer look."

Not to be ultra pc or anything, but I wrote that because I've found it to be true - especially for me. I do NOT make good first impressions. Seriously - it's a wonder I have a job. This could be due to the fact that I don't feel comfortable around most people until I've known them for a while. And I'm talking some milage here: give me a year, and I'll warm right up to you - I swear! You may not dig me right away, but a quick year will go by and you'll wonder how you ever lived without me.

So, I figure that if it's true for me, it's got to be true for everyone (and hopefuly in a pleasant way). Everyone's got a few surprises up their sleeves. In the last few weeks alone two people stand out in my mind who I've had the chance to get to know a little bit better. The first is guy is a bit slower than most people, and didn't strike me as the most social person in the world. But I happened to go to his house one night and it was like walking into Martha Stewart's place! There were carved pumpkins all along his driveway (this was before Halloween) and the house was completely decorated for fall. There was also a home-cooked meal ready for us all to enjoy, that I probably could never dream of having the skills to make.

The second guys is someone who I had always seen as a fun-loving, goofball kind of person who was rather rough around the edges. I learned that he used to be a soldier stationed in both Iraq and Afghanistan. One time, he was in the mountains with 23 other soliders when they were attacked by an estimated 200-strong Taliban force. Evac couldn't get them out so they had to stay and fight with ammo air-dropped into their camp. This guy got shot in the back with an AK-47, but his vest stopped it from killing him. But needles to say, he thought he was going to die. When the dust settled, 18 of his men including him were able to escape. He has post-traumatic stress and sometimes wakes up in the middle of the night screaming.

So yeah. I guess the moral of the story is that first impressons suck. We all make them and they tend to stick with us for a while. I don't know about you, but I really apreciate it when people give me the benifit of the doubt and hang out with me more than once. It's good to remember that everyone has some depth to them.