I apologise for saying sorry
October 2009
So I was out at a social do the other night and throughout the course of the evening I was being introduced, as is so often the case at these things, to a bunch of people I didn’t know.Now I’m normally a very outgoing, sociable and friendly kind of chap who will get on with anybody and I generally don’t feel awkward in the presence of unfamiliar faces – I can usually manage a few minutes of small talk before I am whisked off to meet the next group of people who claim that we have already met and I have to awkwardly pretend to remember them. But there are certain social situations where I start to feel very self conscious and one of these is being introduced to friends of friends, especially when the new person in question is a woman.
Now let me quickly explain before you get the wrong impression and think I’m some kind of woman hating homosexual. When blokes meet it’s a relatively straight forward process: Whether you know them or not, you greet each other by shaking hands. If it is a woman I know and I’m already friends with I’ll give them a brief hug and a peck on the cheek. The problem comes when I am introduced to a female for the first time. I feel that a hand shake is a bit too much of a bloke thing and maybe a bit too formal. I think a peck on the cheek is a bit too forward and I’m worried that I might come across as being some kind of desperate fool who just likes to touch girls. So what does one do in this situation?
I usually have this little voice in my head that says ‘stop being such a pussy, show a bit of character and go in with the peck on the cheek’ so I’ll start to lean in but then I’ll have a crisis of confidence half way in, try to back out and go with the handshake but it’s too late by this stage. I will miss the hand shake window and realise I’m not confident at all with the angle of approach to the cheek and I’ll end up getting it all wrong and sticking my tongue in her ear and it all ends in disaster.
On a number of occasions I’ve gone for the same side of the cheek as the other person and we’ve almost ended up French kissing each other – extremely embarrassing when your respective other halves are standing next to you.
Not so long ago when I was bidding my farewells to a friend of mine, I had a real dilemma on my hands. Now my friend and I shook hands as is the norm but his daughter approached me with her arms out expecting the hug and kiss treatment. I panicked a little bit at this because she is only about thirteen and I’m a little unsure on the rules about grown men hugging young girls so I pretty much ignored her and beat a hasty retreat before I could be accused of crimes of the Gary Glitter order.
More recently, to avoid any tongue-in-ear French kissing humiliation, I have resorted to greeting women I don’t know by giving them a rather pathetic wave and a smile. This seems to work fairly well but I can’t help feeling that I’m coming across as rude and aloof.
It is at times like this that I’m almost ashamed to be English. Most other countries in the world are so laid back by social greetings and it is not seen as a big deal. Most Asian countries just bow to each other, doing away with any potential danger of indecent assault. On the continent, it is quite acceptable to kiss on the cheek – The French sometimes up to four times. The Italians find it perfectly acceptable to embrace each other and rub private parts while the Scandinavians will greet each other by taking their clothes off and jumping in a freezing cold lake together. The Americans, on the other hand, just resort to shouting very loudly and making whooping noises.
I think the fundamental problem with us Brits is that we are too polite. For instance, we are always apologising. Why do we do this? I’m particularly guilty of apologising unnecessarily. If somebody bumps into me in a crowded place we both say sorry. Why the hell am I saying sorry? I should be saying ‘Oi mate watch where you’re going’ and if I was an American I would… and then I would sue them.
That kind of attitude just doesn’t work if you are British. It certainly doesn’t work if you are English. The Scots can probably get away with it because their accent makes everything they say sound like they’re starting a fight but the point is we as a nation are just not suited to such rudeness, despite our best efforts.
A fine example of unnecessary apologizing comes when we hear bad news. A few years ago when my Nan died, I had to inform those I work with that I needed to disappear for a day to attend the funeral. I was met with a chorus of ‘Oh sorry to hear that’ and ‘I’m really sorry’. Why on earth were they sorry? Did they kill her?
I hated that day because funerals are a place where care has to be taken if you are somebody like me. Whenever I am at a funeral, or any place where the mood is solemn, I just have one thought going through my mind: How bad would it be if I were to laugh? Of course that thought makes me want to laugh so I end up having to stifle a double laugh. Then another thought hits me: How bad would that double laugh have been? And suddenly I’m in a vicious laugh cycle. It is not helped at all by hymns like ‘All things bright and beautiful’, which of course contains the eternally funny line about a ‘purple headed mountain’...
So basically, although I spend a lot of my time talking to people and smiling politely, nothing can escape the fact that I am British and consequently socially retarded and I apologise for this.
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