It's nice to know people are willing to point out your mistakes

By Margi Washburn


Sometimes it really hits home. You know, like when you’re on the receiving end of some well-deserved criticism that makes you want to crawl into a hole and pull the cover over the top.

My mom used to say, “what goes around, comes around.” Others call it Karma, and we’ve all heard that we reap what we sow. I wish someone had pounded that truth home to me years ago. Of course, I wish I’d started writing years ago, too, but that’s beside the point.

It used to tickle me pink to catch someone in a mistake. The more often they made the same mistake, the more I’d wonder how anyone could be so stupid. And it seemed important to share that juicy information with friends and family.

Now that I’m older and a tad wiser, at least at the moment, I see how judgmental that was. Plus, I got blasted in spades the other day and it made me stop and ask what I’d done to deserve such a cruddy 24 hours.

The morning started with hubby wanting to know why his unmentionables were now pink. I’d just bought a couple of maroon and navy blue face towels to go with the bathroom that he’s remodeling, but those were waiting to be washed separately. Seems, though, I forgot about a new long-sleeved maroon shirt someone had thrown in the laundry basket.

Within minutes, the phone rang and someone most of us are familiar with at one time or another put a different kind of damper on the morning. I shrugged it off and headed for work.

Before long it was time to head to bible study. I figured there was time for a good cup of coffee, so I headed to a favorite spot and maneuvered our car into the drive-thru lane. Weird things were happening with the speaker system, but that was nothing new. I wasn’t told to pay at the first window, yet habit forced me to stop there anyway.

It seems that I turned invisible at about that time because the young lady simply ignored me as if I wasn’t there. She pressed buttons on her machine, never looked at me once and I could see cars lining up behind me. Perhaps it was time to move forward.

Then again, perhaps I was wrong. I figured that out when I heard, “Heeeeey!” Now I was stuck halfway between windows one and two with an angry employee now giving me her full attention and a tongue-lashing.

I tried yelling back that I didn’t know what to do because she wasn’t paying attention to me, and I couldn’t back up unless I wanted to cause a wreck. I pulled up to the second window, only to be told that it would be a few minutes because, this young lady told me in a stern voice, I hadn’t paid where I was supposed to. I tapped my watch and said I was going to be late, and besides, the first woman ignored me. The window was firmly shut and I waited, just like a good little customer who had done a stupid, stupid thing.

I wasn’t feeling like someone who was on their way to bible study, but I had my coffee. It wasn’t prepared like I’d asked and paid for but there was no way I was going to complain.

Things went reasonably well until that night when I went to cover an event for the paper. On my way down Third Street, I saw a maniacal driver coming so fast down a side street to my right that I knew it was going to be close. This didn’t seem to matter to Mr. Pick-up Truck because he blew the stop sign and flung himself into the same parking lot I was headed. I couldn’t wait to see what he looked like.

Turned out this was someone who may have been running late for a board meeting. I walked through the doors shortly after he did and checked the guy out just as he was sitting down. I shook off my anger and found my way to my assignment.

In less than 20 minutes, in the midst of a conversation with a friend, I was made aware that I had made a faux pas in an article I’d done about someone several months ago. I was assured repeatedly that it was no big deal, but it was a huge deal to me. I was mortified, and things were about to get worse because someone overheard most of the conversation. A strong opinion was expressed, and I had it coming, but it still hurt like the dickens and nearly ruined the rest of the evening.

Later that night hubby and I drove over to his mom’s house and I drowned my sorrows in hot coffee and chocolate cookies. We had some laughs, and talked for hours. By the time we went home, everything from pink underwear to snarly clerks and a well-deserved comeuppance had all but faded from memory.

Still, I think I’ll watch my mouth and heed those old sayings. It couldn’t hurt, right?