The Truth About Awkward

It’s whenever I catch myself in an accidental awkward situation that I automatically remind myself to be strong, by remembering and accepting that awkward happens to all people.

Today at lunch I ordered utterly-delicious lemon-pepper salmon with a side of totally-awesome asparagus. It was a cafeteria that I was in. A very nice cafeteria, which was run by very nice people, and frequented by very nice and nicely-dressed folks.

I brought my tray of fish and vegetables to a checkout counter. Any ol’ checkout counter would do. At this checkout counter, the cashier was a nice lady who spoke softly and somewhat slurred her words together. It was loud in the room. She pushed a couple of buttons on her machine, looked me in the eye, and said “$7.05” (“seven-oh-five”). That uncannily rhymed with “salmon and a side”…

Having just heard in my ears and mind salmon and a side, I looked her in the eye, and emphatically and proudly replied “Yes!”

And I stood there. For enough seconds for it to be awkward. She dumbfoundedly kept looking at me, clearly wondering when in the heck I was going to fork over the 10-dollar bill that was snug in my left hand. Then suddenly it hit me: she had said “$7.05”! SEVEN. OH. FIVE. Oh mercy.

And so I hurriedly gave her my money and my thanks, snatched my change, and ran away. I vowed to not visit that lady’s checkout counter for a while. You know, so she could have enough time to forget about how I was a dweeb.

We all find ourselves in awkwardville every now and then. If you’re one of the probably-many people who easily feel mortified immediately after having experienced even the briefest and flimsiest awkward moment, I challenge you to fix that. Don’t sweat those little things, because there are bigger and more embarrassing things you could accidentally do that are far more worthy of mortification. ;) But don’t sweat those too badly either. Everyone makes mistakes, but everyone also always has the chance to learn from their mistakes and become better, so long as they are a living, breathing organism in this world. The key is trust in Heavenly Father and His Son Jesus Christ, forgiveness of others and of self, charitable brotherhood and sisterhood, and the belief that man and woman can improve.

Anyway, keep up the great work in your awkward-moment chagrin conquerings!