Clam Up, Zip It, Pipe Down

The reason I don't talk very much in the company of strangers is that I've learnt that people don't necessarily understand what you are really trying to say.

People hear but whether or not they get the real message depends not only on the words you are uttering but on the expression on your face, the volume of your voice and the speed you are saying it.

The other reason being that I've noticed people sometimes ask questions without really wanting to know the answer. Some call it being friendly or being sociable. It's called small talk.

Now me, I'm really bad at small talk. When I call people up, I don't spend 3 minutes asking how you are, how was the drive to work and all that rubbish. Unless THAT's the reason I'm calling you. So people think I am unfriendly or unsociable.

People can be rather fickle. They say they celebrate honesty. HONESTY IS THE BEST POLICY, they say - yet when it smacks them in the face, and God forbid it if it was something that they don't want to hear - they call people who say it to them TACTLESS or BLUNT or INSENSITIVE.

When I was a houseman, I was called an idiot a few times. But I took it with a smile and brushed it away because I knew that I was an idiot back then. Afterall, I'd rather be called an idiot than irresponsible. The only time I cried after I was told off by a specialist was when she called me to her room asking for an explanation to why the discharge summary isn't ready. I remember that I had already completed it and I insisted that I did. She didn't believe me and told me to rewrite the discharge summary by asking for the history of the patient.

It turned out that I HAD completed it and they later found it somewhere beneath the paperwork. I actually went to see her and showed her the completed discharge summary, proving that I was not making excuses.

But I digress - so we humans are fickle and are almost always ruled by our emotions - which I guess is what makes us humans in the first place.

So I've learnt to never volunteer an opinion unless it warrants me to do so or when I am in the midst of people I really trust. The latter being that I hoped that these people will accept that regardless of what ZINGS may have flown from my mouth that I don't really say it with malice but more of letting of steam.