My Experience with Attitudinal Responses

I’ve graduated from the school of hard knocks when it comes to my attitudinal response and how I deal with it.  It would have been nice had I had this class twenty years ago, I wouldn’t have had the experiences to feel like a heel, make me look at myself and why I think this way.  So yes, I’m aware of my attitudinal response, and I’ve learned to let it simmer until I really find out what’s going on.

The first attitudinal response experience happened when I was just eight years old.  My Dad is a cowboy/team roper and all that entails.  Let’s just say he looks the part.  We were at a roping in northern California when this young kid (maybe 25ish?) showed up with longer blond curly hair, a Hawaiian shirt, and spurs on his tennis shoes.  My Dad said, “Are you kidding me?  Get that shiz outa here, this isn’t a hippie roping.”  This kid is what we in the roping world like to call a wolf.  He not only out roped them but out roped them all week-end and took everyone’s money, including my Dad’s.  Dad did give him a run for his money, but this kid as we would come to know as Tommy Flenniken, proved to us that how you are dressed is no indication of how good a roper you are.  And really in life.  While we'd like to think we can judge others aptitudes, and/or character by the way their dressed, I have been wrong way too many times.  My Dad still likes to tell that story to this day.  That was my first “drunk Mexican,” as it were. 

The second story is more of an attitudinal response in reverse, but a lesson all the same.  I would’ve been about 30 years old and my oldest son was 5, his sister 2 ½ and a brand new baby.  We would always stop at a gas station in Alpine on our way to Idaho Falls, top off, grab our bug juice and cheese sticks (Chance is Hypolgycemic so he had to have some protein with all that sugar) and we'd be on our way.  There was a young girl that reminds me of Johanna Mason on The Mockingjay played by Jena Malone, that was the cashier there.  She wore all black, different colored hair monthly, various body piercings etc...she was just a tough nut to crack.  But her and my Chance had this kind of funky endearing relationship.  She was kind of ornery to him, and he just thought she was funny.  He just found her being different, interesting I think.  You have to remember that this was 15 years ago, way before Hunger Games and this type of look was acceptable.  Anyway, I didn't know her name so we'll call her Johanna, was smoking outside when we pulled up to the station.  I proceeded to get the kids out, and Chance ran up to her, stood on the curb, his little hands were in fists and he yelled at her, "Smoking is bad, stop it!" and he ran into the store.  She looked at me and said, "Tell your self-righteous little brat that smoking isn't bad and he should keep his comments to himself."  I took a deep breath and said, "Well, that's one way to look at it.......Or........ his Grandpa just died of lung cancer after months of suffering, so maybe, Chance just likes you, and he doesn't want you to die." She glared at me and threw her cigarette down and walked in the store.  I got the baby out of her car seat and came upon this scene:  Chance was standing there with bug juice and cheese stick in hand, she was knelt down talking to him.  "So you had a rough week huh?" He just looked at the floor.  "I'll tell ya what, I won't quit, but I promise to cut back and only smoke if I absolutely have to."  His little tear stained cheeks looked up at her-  "Promise?" 

"I promise." He dropped his treats and grabbed her by the neck and hugged her as tight as he could.  At first her hands were straight at his side not touching him, she finally put her arms around him and they hugged.  That juxtaposition of my "self-righteous" five year old and this purple-haird, tatooed, pierced gal is forever burned into my brain.  We never saw Johanna again, but her and Chance's interaction forever changed me.  She had an attitudinal response toward him, and I was just privy to her changing and opening her heart.

My third experience with attitudinal response took place a couple of year's after Chance's experience with Johanna.  I had met this gal at a party and something told me she was struggling, and I thought I really needed to reach out to her in friendship.  So for a year, I'd go out of my way to say hi, tried to strike a conversation, suggest we might do something while the kids were in school.  I got no reciprocation out of this girl at all.  One day I was in the grocery store and she was ahead of me in the line.  So I smiled and said hi, and tried to make small talk.  She paid for her groceries, glared at me and ran out the door.  I thought to myself, "That's it!  I've had it.  I'm done making an effort with her, what a snot!"  So from then on I didn't really acknowledge her existence.  When I'm done, I'm done.  A couple month's later we got an invite to her yearly Christmas party.  I was shocked we got it and even considered not going, but we went.  An hour after the party started she pulled me aside and asked if we could talk.  She said, "Remember that day at the grocery store?"  Uh yeah, the day I wrote you off?  I thought to myself.  "Well, I have (a rare condition) and I barely made it to the car and threw up.  The kid who was gathering the carts said he'd be back with a hose.  I was so embarrassed.  I have been so sick for over a year, but I have since had surgery.  But I just wanted you to know, that I know I've been distant, but I just was so miserable, I couldn't do anything, even if I wanted to.  So yah, I'd love to do something now."  Oh my gosh, talk about making me feel three inches tall.  Here I had labeled this girl as a stuck up snot, written her out of my life when she was dealing with some pretty heavy stuff.  We ended up becoming pretty good friends.  That moment taught me that while things may look normal, we never really know what other people are going through.

These experiences and 30 years more have taught me that things aren't always what they seem.  Take a step back and as I like to say, just let things unfold.  I've learned to do it in all areas of my life.  And nowadays when I recognize I have an automatic response I am able to catch myself and ask why.  Some answers don't come overnight but they will come eventually.  Sometimes I feel like a real failure when they happen, but the only time you fail is if you don't learn.  So I learn and move on, and isn't that what life's all about?