It’s everywhere. You stop at a drive-through window and can’t quite hear what is being said, and then the body-less voice curtly informs you she’s already given you your total.

You enter a business 20 minutes after it’s opened only to be told in a brusque tone, “You’ll have to wait before I can do anything. You know we just opened.”

You try to say good morning to the mail delivery person who, never looking up from her phone, barely grunts a response. (All as he or she is depositing your mail in your next-door neighbor’s box.)

Why is everyone so rude? It’s become so rare to have a positive customer service experience that when we do, we tell everyone we know…and they are usually as amazed as we are. The rule used to be that if you have a good experience, you tell 3 or 4 people. But if you have a bad experience, you tell about 15 people, who usually turn around and tell a few more. So you can see the value of good customer service.

But these days, it’s so rare to have a friendly encounter, the rule seems to have flopped….you’ll tell anyone who will listen!

And of course it’s not just customer service. It’s on the internet. In the classrooms. Behind the wheel. And most disgustingly of all, in politics. The days of senators passionately disagreeing with one another in a debate, and then meeting later for a cocktail or dinner to share a friendship, seem long gone. Today’s it ugly. It’s heated. And right from the very top, it’s quite often vulgar.

There’s a word I used to wonder about when I was a kid. Vulgar. Just the sound of it was bad. Yet nowadays, it’s more common than not.

I know most baby boomers were raised by people who did not speak this way, or at least, not in public. You certainly didn’t speak to your teachers or professors with such disrespect. And it’s also not fair to label this as just a generational thing, as we see every day, it’s every age.

It’s just a shame. It’s so much easier to take a breath and say thank you. Or you’re welcome. Or excuse me. Or sorry, my fault. Or even, you’re right.

Maybe we can’t change the world. But maybe, we can each change our world, one experience at a time. Maybe when someone is rude, we can muster up our inner wise child and smile even broader. We can be even nicer. It’s not easy, but it might give the other person a reason to re-consider the moment.

Because no matter how old we are, we’re all kids inside…often scared, lonely, lost, missing someone who isn’t here. Instead of fanning the flames, let’s douse some of the anger with kindness.

Civility. It could be the next great comeback.


“Three things in human life are important: the first is to be kind. The second is to be kind. And the third is to be kind.” Henry James