A Valuable Life Lesson

I'd like to clarify something.
I know that I previously claimed to judge people.

I think I misused the word judge.

I guess that I was just horrified that she claimed to know literature when her perception of what is considered literature varies from mine. I mean really, literature is any kind of writing in prose or verse. I still think she's a wonderful person, which I did mention in the beginning. And unlike her, I won't dismiss someone because they do not choose to pick up a book for recreational use.

Let me give you an example of a time when I did not judge someone but they in turn judged me and really made me rethink my opinion about a lot of things. In December, I went to my boyfriend's company Christmas party with him. I had on a sexy black dress and rocked the four inch black patent pumps. We sat next to one of the people who works in the company's plant. My boyfriend is an environmental chemist and a lot of the people that work for the company in the plant are ex-convicts. This charming fellow happened to have gone to prison for operating a crystal meth lab in Alaska. Sitting to his right was his girlfriend.

Looking at her, you could tell she had a hard life. She was overweight and looked weathered, with her perm, cheap sweater and ratty black pants. I didn't judge her yet I didn't pity her. I had no opinion on her. I tried to say something to her a few times and every time the only response I received was a full-on glare. Throughout the course of dinner, the two argued over who was drinking and who was driving home. The kicker is this argument had nothing to do with the safety of their own lives and others. It had everything to do with the fact that she has a breathalyzer in her car. In order to start the car, you have to blow. Every few minutes while driving, it will instruct you to blow again. This is to make sure no one other than the driver had blown into it to start the car. If it detects alcohol, you have about forty-five second to pull over to the shoulder before the car shuts itself off. How does one get such a wonderful contraption in their car in the state of Washington? All it takes is a few drunk driving convictions! So why didn't they just take his car? Oh, that's right. He had his license revoked and is not allowed to have a car registered in his name.

So it was decided that she would drive. Yet every time he wasn't looking, she reached over and downed his glass of wine. In seconds. I've never seen someone gulp down alcohol so fast. And there was that period of forty-five minutes that she was "in the bathroom." In all, I didn't give much thought to them, other than I thought it was sad that they could talk about the breathalyzer in her car in front of everyone at the dinner table like it was the latest fashion accessory that everyone had.

Come Monday, I get a phone call from the boyfriend. Apparently this woman asked her boyfriend if V. always dates girls who are such bitches. She went on to say that I'm incredibly full of myself and that I think I'm better than everyone. Excuse me? I was the one who went out of my way to speak to her and she was the one who couldn't even spare me one word in return. Was it because I was dressed formally, like everyone else? The fact that I can form a sentence intelligently? Or is it the that I realize it's not 1987 and perms aren't in anymore. Maybe it was the look of horror that flashed across my face when her boyfriend asked me what kind of girl I am, if I am a "bad girl" and then winked. I didn't even mention to her that I will not drive even if I've had only one drink because I think of the safety of others, as well as my own well being.

If I had known she felt that way about me, I would have had no problem leaning over and letting her know that her boyfriend tells everyone at work that his girlfriend is fat and ugly and that he only dates her because he knows she will never cheat on him.

That was my lesson in judging, to the max.