The Death of Common Courtesy

When did people stop giving the courtesy wave when you let them merge in front of you on the highway?

Or stop making sure that the person directly behind them got through the door before they let it close?

Or stop responding to your hello when you pass them in the hallway?

I'm seriously getting worried for my children.

What's life going to be like when they are my age?

Three times this past week at work I've passed people in the hallway and said hello, with zero response. Zero!

And I know they heard me. I was literally six inches away from them. It's not a very wide hallway. Two of them even looked me in the eye.

It's honestly extremely annoying and rude.

But I try to put myself in other people's shoes.

Here are some theories I have:

• The guy in the hallway that didn't say hello back has laryngitis

• The girl that looked me in the eyes and didn't respond forgot to put in her contact lenses so she couldn't really see me

• The driver in front of me that I let merge didn't wave because she only had one hand and needed it on the steering wheel

• The guy at Kwik Trip that let the door close on me has terrible peripheral vision and didn't know I was there.

Seems plausible, right?

I sure hope so, because I refuse to believe that we're becoming a society of rude, insensitive jerks.

I don't want my boys to live their adult lives in a world like that. I want them to know what common courtesy is, and more importantly, to demonstrate it to others.

So I try to model it as much as I can for them.

I wave when someone lets me merge on the highway, I say hello to everyone I pass by in the hallway, and I'm typically the first one to hold the door open when there are people behind me. And if I fail in these areas, I also try to own up to it and apologize.

My boys are growing up in a world filled with distractions. It's normal and common to only socialize online these days. They are more susceptible to becoming those insensitive people who lack common courtesy.

I do have to catch them sometimes and call them on it when they are so distracted that they neglect the real people around them.

This culture of less and less human connection is slowly causing the death of common courtesy.

I don't know about you, but I don't want to attend that funeral.

It will be depressing and lonely and no one will talk to each other. We'll all just sit there, lost in our own little worlds, staring at our phones.

How sad...

But then, just when I think that people are at their worst, I see glimpses of it and I have hope that we can still keep common courtesy alive.

• The woman in front of me at the grocery store lets me skip the line because I only have five things and she has twelve.

• The man behind me at the gas station picks up the glove that I dropped when filling up and stops me from driving away without it.

• Someone at work offers me their laptop charger when my laptop is about to die and I'm going to be giving a presentation.

So let's band together and not let it die.

Raise your hand and give that courtesy wave when you merge (and say thank you, even if that driver can't hear you!).

Say hello to that coworker in the hallway and look them in the eye and smile while you do it.

And for the love of God...hold the damn door!