Dear Readers,

After a long dry blogging spell, I will now start fresh, and promise to enter a new post  every 7-10 days. I hope you will comment, and add your wit and wisdom to the conversations.

Today's topic is about what happens when people ask, " So, how are you?"  It is obvious that people asking that question rarely want an honest answer, which is exactly what motivates me to provide one. Yes, I'm that way.

I have heard all the reasonable arguments about saying the positives, and focusing on the good things and in short that tends to amount to saying something trivial, insincere or blatantly dishonest
rather than actually answering the question a fair percentage of the time.

Now, I'm not advocating that you spew forth a laundry list of your complaints and challenges, but on the other hand, if you are having a day when you feel like getting hit by a bus would be a break from whatever's going on, then you might consider actually telling the truth.  "Actually, I feel like hell today, I can't wait to go to bed and put the day behind me." 

Conversely, if you are having a truly exhilarating day or you won the lottery, or just had the best sex you've had all decade, saying 'I'm fine" just doesn't cut it either.  I prefer to consider the possibility that if I answer authentically when someone asks me, "How are you?" that my honestly is an invitation for contact, friendship and intimacy, which may otherwise get lost under the convenient, familiar half truths we typically speak to each other.

In May I was in a car accident, and while people love to ask " Hey, how're ya doin?" , what they want to hear is that I'm  "Good. Fine. Improving, On the mend..." and anything else along those lines. Yet I discovered that if I say those things they want to hear, I feel like an idiot and give the impression that I'm working and living life as usual which is absolutely not true. 
What's true is that I feel broken, my life is still completely disrupted, I'm still in a wheelchair, I won't start PT for weeks, I get exhausted easily, and  everything I have to do to take care of myself from getting up to pee in the middle of night to trying to wash dishes while balancing on one leg is a challenge. Not to mention constantly having to ask people to please pick up my mail, do my laundry, etc. Which, by the way, even the best of friends get tired of doing.   
 So sure, I'm glad to be alive, and happy to have friends that run the errands that keep my life and my business moving forward. AND, some days suck, pure and simple.   In the past 10 years I haven't had much going on in the misery department, so even my honest comments on a 'bad' day were funny though  a bit snarky. But this is a whole different ballgame.

In telling the truth, I have found that even most people who don't especially want to hear the truth end up having a deeper more authentic conversation with me about their own lives and  how THEY are really doing.  It's good.

So...How are you?

Raven