image management

Neighbor downstairs (duplex) came to pay me his monies for last month's utilities. He handed me the $$, I gave him a brief, "Thanks, (only friendlier, in Spanish)," and he said "Por nada." He started to walk away, then turned and regaled me with a tale of, "You know how it is, you go around all day thinking there's something you're forgetting, and you just can't think of what it is." And I, playing along, go, "Yeah - fortunately you've got me as your portable memory bank to help you remember. But only on *that* one thing, of course."

Boundaries, boundaries. Connection. The dance between the two.

And recognizing that with many people, it's more about image management than it is an actual attempt to CONNECT. Have to think about this more, but that's a place to start.

***
I kind of suspect that, for most people, the kind of interaction I describe above is par for the course, standard, nothing special. Absolutely, completely 'normal'.

Whereas to *me*, it's a kind of manipulation, it's bullshit. It's a "Look over here, see what *this* hand's doing," while the other hand is busy pulling off some complicated shenanigans, like a magic trick.

It's not really a *moral* issue, per se, so much as a , "How much can I trust this person" kind of thing.

The thing is, if you come from a family like *mine*, where you were basically expected to continually put your faith in people who were untrustworthy, then you're kind of fucked. Your basic mental mapping, emotional hardwiring, is all scrambled, hooked together wrong.

I'm getting the mental image of my favorite robot from Short Circuit, where he's busy re-wiring his own circuits so that he can be independent and operate the way *he* wants to, instead of being vulnerable to any stray passerby taking him down with the literal 'flick of a switch,' namely, by pushing his 'off' button.