“Anyone, anyone?  Give up your chair for a seventy year-old senior citizen with his hands full?”

There weren’t any takers in the small row of healthy younger adults, swigging from their beer bottles, at a recent barbecue.  I recounted the event to dismayed friends, and surprised myself by excusing the culprits – they didn’t know any better.  They were just socially awkward.

Before you chastise me, think of your own circles, and the many times you have skipped the obvious judgment and gone with a kinder S.A. diagnosis.   People you are meeting for the first time, who show up at your dinner empty-handed, with three unexpected children, and a visiting relative.   Before you can even mutter hostess gift under your breath, the kids have terrorized your timid cat; dad is bulldozing your neighbors with his stock tips; and mom is sitting center-stage on your sofa ordering “a very dry white wine, please.”

Why don’t we just state unabashedly this family is rude, and should not be invited again?  Instead, we propose they enter our homes one more time where they will undoubtedly be even more comfortable engaging in S.A. behavior.  For by that time, they will think we are friends.

We are simply unable to call a spade a spade for fear of being deemed rigid or too proper.  Perhaps we are too Victorian in our sensibilities to navigate freely through modern-day social norms.  Any negative traits we see immediately get turned into a justification, exculpating the offender, and designed to trigger our empathy.  Disruptive kids?  They have attention deficit disorder.  Constantly interrupting adults?  They have it too.  Meddling personalities?   Must be obsessive-compulsive.   Extremely clingy?  Nope, it’s separation anxiety.

If I’m honest, I’ll admit to using a more benign diagnosis for some of my own unbecoming behaviors.  A little too much couch cuddling and Ben & Jerry’s?  That’s because I am battling social anxiety.  Too lazy to walk to the gym?  My seasonal affective disorder often plagues me.

Next time I encounter a bad-mannered human, I will stop her in her tracks and tell her exactly what I think of her conduct. Then, I will suddenly shove her out of my way.  And it will all be OK, because I am S.A.