Scalzi's Weekend Assignment #37

We all know what our best personal quality is. What's your second-best personal quality?

Extra Credit: Note a personal quality you wish you had more of.

As usual, I’m sure I’ll end up twisting this assignment into knots. Mainly because I have the feeling my definition of a personal quality [i.e. sushi lover] isn’t as on point as people think it should be. But here goes.

I think my best personal quality isn’t the one that seems most obvious. My most obvious one is being able to make you laugh. I’m also a great audience. A guy I know can make ME laugh just by saying, "So a rabbi and a priest walk into a bar. . ."  And I'm on the floor. But I kid.

Okay serious, now. I'm biting my cheeks to keep from smiling.

My best personal quality is making people feel that I really understand them. That I get their hopes and aspirations, their feelings and concerns in ways no one else ever has. I don’t know how I am able to make these deep connections, but I wouldn’t trade the experience. 

I think my second best quality is loyalty.  If you are my friend, you are my friend for life.  UNLESS you freaking lie to me. Then you don't exist.

I spent a year working with a well-known local battered women’s advocate, getting her on TV shows and in the newspaper. We became good friends, talking for an hour every night, making plans for press conferences, interviews, future events, etc.

Then I found out from one of her bodyguards [!!!] that she was making up stories about some of her work. And a producer from a talk show called to complain about something she did at the station, which she lied about to me. 

I called her on the lie, she denied it, I hung up and haven’t spoken to her since, even though she still sends me invitations to events she’s speaking at.

I’m still friends with another woman who tried to steal my boyfriend. Why?  Because she didn’t lie about it. When I asked her, she admitted going after him and we agreed that to save our friendship I wouldn't drive over her with my car.

As for a personal quality I wish I had more of – what’s the opposite of self-deprecating? Self-medicating? Whatever it is, I need more of it. I’m usually the first person to make a joke about myself, although not as much as I used to. Before it was 24/7.  Now I think I do it more to hide my own arrogance than to put myself down.

Another personal quality I could use more of is control. Less leaping up from my chair. But I bet that's not considered a traditional personal quality. Okay, how about more reticence.  Or being more laconic. We'll turn this into an SAT exam soon. RESTRAINT, that's the word I want!!!!!!!!! I could use MORE restraint. In fact, they named a show after me -- CURB YOUR ENTHUSIASM. I think you get what I'm talking about. 

Sheesh.  I may have to come back and put some jokes in here.  This assignment was way too serious.