Manners and the Good Ole South!!

The other day as I was leaving the Wilk an older gentleman copiously held the door open for me saying, “My mother’s watching.” and he looked up with a shine in his eye. The sweetness of his sentiment made my eyes smart, too. His mother taught him well. He learned to love, cherish, respect, and serve women from his mother and he still wanted to please her. (Alma 56:48) HINT #11: If your mother wouldn’t approve of your actions if she were watching you, change your actions.

At this point, I feel that a confession on my part is owed to you, my readers. I’m just like every other girl here at BYU. I have watched every version of Pride and Prejudice that I’m aware of. I have seen and loved Gone With the Wind. My apartment has at least one copy of the following: A Walk to Remember, Pride and Prejudice (6 hour version), P&P (Kiera Knightly), P&P (Mormon AKA Pink Bible), P&P (Bollywood), various other “period dramas”, The Princess Bride, and approximately 90% or more of the movies we have are chick flicks. In fact, the only way that I might be different from other girls is that I’ve read the original books or plays that our movies are based on- all of them. I’ve read the entire Austen anthology, I’ve read Gone With the Wind and all of the sequels (authorized and not), and I’ve read all of the Twilight Series. In a matter of days.

About Twilight, I enjoyed the story. Meyers is a good story teller. She’s horrid at grammar, sentence structure, and non-redundant word choice. But, that’s why her work is my guilty pleasure, my brain candy. HINT #12: I know you hate the idea, but put up with the phenomenon. We love it; we eat that BS up. It’s because it’s a completely unrealistic love story about a guy and girl who are completely devoted to each other. The fact that Edward is intelligent, an accomplished pianist, holds multiple degrees in medicine (see Midnight Sun), knows Bella better than she knows herself, knows her faults and loves her strengths, and is willing to do anything for her while still maintaining his own moral code only adds to the warm fuzzies we love to get. Here’s a worthwhile guy! She wants to sleep with him and he won’t do it until they’re married. (He’s a bit too perfect-seeming, and thereby boring, for my personal taste but that’s another story.)

HINT #13: It’s the silly, sentimental things you do that get you the serious brownie points. Case in point, I was having a horrible week. Life was busy with papers, projects, finals quickly approaching, and on top of that I got sick. A choice son of God whom I don’t like was over and offended me. My good friend that I’ll call N was a god-send. N. was able to see that my feelings were hurt and he could tell that I was having a horrible day. He was supportive, kind, gave me a hug, and made me laugh. He did this out of the kindness of his heart and it wasn’t a big deal to him. The unexpected perk for his kindness is that every single girl that we know in common was told the glowing tale. I told any girl that would listen what a great guy N is and how he was my hero for the day/week. I had everyone one of them oohing and ahhing over how wonderful N is. Guys, do you hear that publicity? Every one of those girls is looking at N more favorably than ever, including his ex-girlfriend! HINT #14: Nothing will get you farther faster than the free publicity of a grateful female discussing your good deed with her friends. And she will tell all of them; it’s just how we are.

I have another confession. I am a girl who worships at the shrine of Southern manners and good ol’ gentlemen. I didn’t realize until recently just how much I missed the manners back home. (I was blessed to be born and raised South of the Mason-Dixon line.) There are some doors at my high school that I didn’t open for myself until me senior year; up until that point, the guys would always get the door for me. HINT # 15: No matter who the female is, hold the door for her. If she isn’t connected to you at all, it’s bonus points. We women are suckers for polite gentlemen.

Along the same lines as the last few hints, here’s a big one. HINT # 16: Treat all women with the same amount of respect as you would want your mother or wife to be treated with. There may be no direct benefit to you right now other than practice and becoming a better man, but it might just catch that hot-seemingly-out-of-your-league bombshell’s attention. Not that you should be polite because of a hope for reward, but…I’m just saying, manners are eye-catching.

There’s more to manners than just holding a door. Manners are about noticing others and anticipating their needs. Polite people pay attention to others. Men who are effortlessly polite to everyone are widely admired and greatly sought after. HINT #17: Compassion, kindness, generosity, and empathy will get you farther than a Visa card with no limit.

http://www.ehow.com/how_2324670_have-good-southern-manners.html

http://www.knowsouthernhistory.net/Culture/Manners/table_of_contents.htm

http://www.victorianstation.com/ettiqgentle.htm

So, thank you kindly for reading and have a great day all ya’ll! I’ll be right back after finals!