Strange Biller’s Unwritten Rules of Social Etiquette

I admit, the fact that these are unwritten rules may be part of the problem. People are too busy, dense and self-absorbed to figure these things out on their own, so as a public service, I will begin a series of entries dedicated to helping people stop being jerks.

These rules are presented in no particular order except the order they come up in during my life.

Rule Number 1: We’ve been over this before, but apparently I need to say it again. When the elevator door opens, you have to wait until the people on the elevator get off before you can get on, you ignorant fucking dipshit. In actuality, this isn’t even a rule of social etiquette, it’s a basic law of physics. You can’t get on the elevator and occupy that space until the people coming out vacate that space. The same goes for subways and buses.

Rule Number 2: When you are traveling on an airplane, bus or train, nobody wants you to chat with them. Keep in mind that I may be the chattiest person on the face of the planet – my wife says I won’t shut up for love or money (which is a demonstrable lie, I might add, as I have often stopped talking for some loving – no one has yet offered me money to be quiet, so I can’t comment on that) – but that doesn’t mean I don’t have at least the tiniest thread of common sense about my blathering.

The key things to remember when you are traveling on a plane, train or bus are that a) you are stuck with this person for a couple hours and b) you have limited personal space.

Now, personal space is an issue in America we take very seriously, and for the most part, people understand the general rules of personal space. If you don’t believe me, the next time you go to, say, the bookstore, walk up next to someone who is flipping through a book and stand six inches away from them while flipping through a book yourself. When the person starts to creep away (and they will), creep along with them. See how long it takes before they say something.

Which is not to say there aren’t those people who don’t have any understanding of the concept of personal space. Those people can be neatly divided into two categories: people with bad breath and drunks. Being drunk seems to eliminate the need to respect other people’s personal space, to which I think anyone who’s ever dealt with a drunk can testify. And apparently there is some sort of law of inverse proportionality governing how bad your breath is to how much personal space you give people.

However, on the whole, Americans like there personal space and understand how to respect the rules associated with it:

• The distance you stand from someone during conversation is directly related to how well you know the person - 24 inches is minimum distance you stand from someone when talking to them unless you are sleeping with them, at which point you may feel free to snuggle.
• Men do not touch each other after the initial handshake (or half-hug if you know the guy like a brother – something we’ll discuss during another rule. Hugging seems to have a whole host of problems which people don’t understand, not the least of which is an international translation issue).
• Do not lean in toward the other person unless you are plotting something on the level of a governmental overthrow.
• And for the love of Pete, do not stand six inches behind me when we are in a line – that minimum is a foot, no, a foot and a half.

When you are engaged in conversation with someone, you are automatically invading their personal space. Don’t get freaked out – this is acceptable. When you converse with someone, you start to share their personal space. The good thing is, when you stop talking, you stop being in their personal space unless you are closer than five feet. If you are closer than five feet when you bring the conversation to a screeching halt by bringing up you intense and burning love for donkeys, you are obligated to move out of the other person’s space (move more than five feet) or at least let them move away from you.

These are rules everyone seems to embrace – except for your occasional idiots, we all observe these rules everyday without even realizing it.

So why is it that when people get on planes, all these rules get tossed? First of all, when you are sitting in the seat next to me, I can’t get away from you, so it would be a better trip from Manchester to Austin if you didn’t mention your fury fetish before the plane even taxis to the runway. Now I’m stuck with you for four hours trying to mentally scrub the images of you from my mind. But chances are, you won’t stop talking to me for another three hours to give my poor mind a rest, anyway.

True story: on a plane ride last week, as guy was chatting me up and I tried to brush him off by being semi-curt with my replies – this didn’t work. I then put my book up in front of my face like a person reading a book in a movie – he still talked. It was amazing. He talked about everything. He analyzed the snacks like they were ….

Where is this going?

Oh yes, I remember now. On a plane/train/bus you are automatically violating personal space boundaries – that’s just the nature of the beast. But to talk to someone and not be able to take the hint that they don’t want to talk to you is not acceptable because you are already TOO FUCKING CLOSE AND THE OTHER PERSON CAN’T RUN AWAY!

I don’t know – this seems obvious to even me and I’m not the sort of person who is ever at a shortage for words. Bah. Stupid people.