Good Morning Digital Neighbors! Happy Sunday to all you friends across the Locals-verse! Apparently the inter-webs has had some cartoon going around that attempts to illustrate the if roles were reversed men would hate getting compliments that women routinely hear. The examples don't seem even remotely sexist to me, perhaps I am just too dense of a clerical clod, but for the most part seem to illustrate what was once common civility.

Whatever this is trying to highlight among the sexes or other members of society with fictitious genders or actual biological gender dysphoria, it puts the spot light on attitude. Are you a person ready to be easily offended? If so, you are embarking on a life journey of misery, isolation and either mental illness or perpetual embittering complaint. While you may find companions for your complaining, you will not find lasting communion.

The Embittered are incapable of communion, of an actual mutual experience of gratitude and shared joy. It is odd because embitterment and perpetual compliant is very close to feeling something like communion and friendship. WE hate or oppose X It might be a person, a group, some ideology or cultural reality. There is a bond caused by opposition to a greater perceived problem or "evil". As long as the problem endures, the bond survives. Unless something more becomes part of the bond it eventually unravels or turns on it self. The fracturing at the end of the alphabet gender letters seems to illustrate that. As the subject of offense become more absurd the bonds grow weaker since any criticism or question regarding the nature of offense warrants your automatic exclusion from the embitterment club.

Somewhere between being perpetually offended and Pollyannaish naivety is thoughtful living. We used to call it decency or civility, I am not sure what it is called today. I strive to be a person of meaningful compliments and authentic gratitude. Often time in my public meanderings I try to be mindful of the humanity around me and their stories' and struggles unknown to me. So many just pass me by without a word, but the ones I engage with at businesses and the like at least get to interact with a version of Tom that tries to be considerate and civil. Simple expressions of gratitude for being at their job, wishing them a jerk free day as they staff a register, holding doors for strangers whatever their Heinz 57 gender might be is all part of trying to make my local experience of humanity better than what I see on the internet or broadcast by the media. Small efforts, but changing the world is always a grassroots reality.

I tend not to be a vapid smiler, I have been told I need to smile more, but I think I smile sufficiently. Exteriorly I tell people "thanks" with an slightly or greatly exaggerated smile, interiorly I know it is their issue (usually right after having thought BITE ME ) and I can patiently weather such things as the little rough edges all of us possess. I am mindful that when I see someone looking burdened, a simple word of recognition and appreciation can go a long way. If they take offense at it a sincere compliment, another critter gets added to the field guide of embitterment recognition. I rarely encounter such people, perhaps that is one of the benefits of rural life. I am not sure.

Civility, charity, patience, kindness all make for a better experience of humanity. I cannot change a culture in decay or a world of extreme fragility, but I can make my little acres of interaction, my frequent stops along the journey of life, more meaningful for myself and those I meet. Happy Sunday Digital Neighbors!