How Are You?

In my opinion, a very innocent or maybe not so very innocent form of inquiry.

I absolutely hate to answer that question because I quite frankly think that it has to be the most loaded question in the history of humanity.

It just gives me that feeling and I could almost believe that I am not a lone with this one.

Let me try and explain myself a little and maybe even delve into the inner workings of my mind from the moment the so-called innocent inquiry is made up until a response is supplied.

The moment someone begins a conversation with that greeting, I feel like the pressure is on to come up with an impressive or at least a good enough response to quench the other individual's desire to snoop around my life.

I might come across as a bit sarcastic (okay very sarcastic) in my opinion of this and that just happens to be a result of the various forms in which this greeting seems to be used in modern day interactions.

If you think about it, the English were ingenious in this regard that they came up with a greeting that supplied absolutely nothing useful about your goings-on, but managed to exude civility towards another individual.

And to imagine that all that genius lies in the simple phrase of "How Do You Do?"--simply amazing.

Let us face it, I have and I believe many others have noticed that in today's world, a lot of people do not even respond to the greeting.

Wouldn't that call for greater use of the ingenious greeting?

In any case, the majority of the people we meet are not even in the slightest bit interested in hearing all the facts about your life.

So then why continue with all the superficiality, why not just make it plainly known with the greeting "How Do You Do?".

Deep down in my dark sarcastic corner, I think that the reason this continues is more towards engaging in a twisted game of life comparison in which the winner gets to see just how pathetic things are on the other side of the fence.

I am so sorry to say this, but I find it hard to take that greeting innocently, so much so that I either dodge it or give the "very well and you" response with a bright smile that secretly says, 'I dare you to cross the line...".


What are your honest thoughts on--How are you?


I Bid You Shalom,


Jacqueline