Tactfully Minding My Mind

I don’t know when it happened, exactly—somewhere between growing up and growing old—but there came a day when I realized I was editing my thoughts before they ever had a chance to see daylight. Not for clarity, not for decency, not even to avoid the occasional foot-in-mouth moment, which I’ve honed into a bit of an art form—but to keep someone else from feeling bad that I might’ve had a point.

I was standing in line at the grocery store not too long ago, the kind of line that wraps around a display of birthday balloons and lukewarm rotisserie chickens. A man in front of me, mid-40s, was arguing with the self-checkout machine as if it owed him child support.

He kept jabbing at the screen, mumbling something about “right-wing technology.” Now, I could’ve told him that the self-checkout wasn’t plotting against him—just asking him to place the item in the bagging area, but I stayed quiet.

Because saying something—even something helpful—might’ve bruised his tender worldview. And Lord knows, the last thing we want to do these days is rattle someone who already suspects the barcode scanner is part of a surveillance plot.

I miss common sense. I do. I miss people who could take a joke without filing a grievance. I miss when knowing something meant you might have to explain it, not apologize for it. And I miss having a conversation where the goal was understanding—not who could cry foul first.

I used to believe that intelligence would always have its say, even if it had to wait its turn. But lately, intelligence has had to sit in the back of the room with its hands folded while nonsense rides shotgun and sings off-key.

Now, don’t get me wrong—I’m no Einstein. I once spent a full ten minutes trying to plug a USB drive upside down, twice. And yet, I know the difference between a fact and a feeling, but it’s hard to share one without stepping on the other.

Even writing this, I feel like I need to tiptoe across each sentence, in case someone with a degree in being offended finds my opinion too pointed. But there comes a time—usually after your second cup of cowboy coolaid and a good long sigh—when you realize that wisdom kept quiet too long starts to feel like cowardice.

So, yes—I’m tired. Tired of pretending I don’t know what I know. Tired of watching smart folks play dumb so that dumb folks can feel smart. And tired of acting like the truth is only valuable if it’s sugarcoated, gift-wrapped, and delivered with an apology.

From now on, I’ll keep being kind—but I’m going to let my thoughts finish a sentence without duct tape over their mouth. If that offends someone, they’ll survive. After all, people used to survive by being told they were wrong. Heck, sometimes it even helped’em grow.

Imagine that.