Not to Offend

The advice in About.Com said, “Send only business Christmas cards that are tasteful. You may think the Christmas card with a naked Santa is hilarious, but this is not the time to try and find out whether your client has a sense of humor.”

The thought of it caused Oldest Daughter to cry with laughter.

“Doesn’t this remind you of dad?” she said through her amusement and literal tears.

Niagara Falls

“Your dad does not send cards to clients. He doesn’t own a business.”   

I responded without giving it deep thought because I was concentrating on grading papers.

“You don’t get my point,” she continued to laugh. “I can see him doing something like that and then get offended because the other person did not think it was funny.”

As I consider it, she is correct. I have seen the younger version of Husband tell jokes or poke fun expecting others to laugh, and when they didn’t he was hurt and held a grudge for many years afterward.

The entire idea reminded me of the story he tells about his mother. It seems she thought it funny to box up a scoop of dog poo and send it to a relative.

It was about 50 years ago when she raised numerous Collie show dogs. She placed a shovel full of it in plastic bags inside plastic bags, lined a mailing box with newspaper, and sent it via mail to the recipient.

The gift was not well received, though Husband and his mother thought it was a most hilarious thing to do.

I suspect the family member is still mad at her even though she has been dead since 1974.

I often wondered if she broke any laws doing it?

We’re talking about impulsive behavior here and lack of social inhibition. Husband makes sense of appropriate behavior based on his understanding from what he has been taught.

He doesn’t mean to be rude, at least much of the time.

I mean he would send one of his sisters an inappropriate card because they have a similar sense of the hysterical, and they would think it is funny, not rude or inappropriate.

He thought the one-eared elephant joke he made during our early dating years would impress me in a positive way. When it didn’t, he got embarrassed, and later told me that I approach life too rigidly!

I think I may have hurt his feelings.

“You’re too stiff,” he once said referring to what I did and did not think was funny.

He’s made similar comments to the kids when they did not laugh at a few of his jokes.  I can imagine his insulted look as he told them they are too much like their mother.

Don’t get me wrong, not all of his humor is ill-fitting. It is sharp and spontaneous like the time he rolled down the window when our son, Crown Prince, was driving. A woman in another lane kept switching lanes and pulling in front of them.

“Where’s your signal?  We can’t read your mind. What do you need, a fat crayon and a Big Chief tablet?”

Or it is like today when he phoned to wish his brother Happy Birthday. When the receptionist answers brother’s business phone,  Husband always says, “Is Ebenezer in?”

He says she always laughs, and says. “I’m sorry, I don’t know who you are asking for.” Husband says, “Yes you do. Now let my talk to my brother.”