In the car with the doors closed

My sister, Lisa, and I have a rule: "Don't talk until you're in the car with the doors closed." This applies to all sorts of situations, from business meetings to social gatherings to shopping. The gist of it is pretty much this: whenever you're in a public place don't talk about people/events/ideas you don't want other people hearing - until you're in a private place. Sounds like common sense... but in practice, it's harder to follow you might think. (First, because elevators, for example, are not private. They may feel private, but you never know who man in the corner is, or what his connection may be to the individual you just had a meeting with.)

My husband and I recently left an especially nightmarish co-op board interview, and as we left I desperately wanted to let him know exactly what I was thinking about: 1.) how unbelievably nosy co-ops are 2.) how unreasonable they are 3.) how pathetic it is for them to wield their tiny momentary sliver of power with such a lack of grace. I waited until we were out of the office... until we were out of the building.... and then started in. "In the car with the doors closed" he reminded me. I looked around, and there were a couple of people I hadn't noticed on the sidewalk not far from us. I waited for a minute... and - of course - they headed into the very building we had just left. Not that it would have been the end of the world if they had heard me ranting about how miserable their building is, and that I never want to set foot there again, but it was better to have that conversation in private. Same goes for the aunt you're gossiping about in Bloomingdale's - if you happen to bump into her five minutes later, she may not have overheard you - but do you want to be frantically going over everything you've said to make sure it 'wasn't that bad?'

My husband likes the rule so much he uses it with his technology group at work. They call it 'the Lemole rule' (because, for some reason, even though I took his name when we married, he still calls me 'Emily Lemole'.)

Sometimes you end up wishing other people used the rule, too. Once I was at a restaurant with a guy I was dating. We were in a rather large group, and I was meeting some of his friends for the first time. They were all Italian (and my Italian's not very good, but I did my best to keep up with the conversation.) Everything seemed to be going okay, until at some point I got up to go to the ladies' room. I had finished using the toilet when I heard voices at the sink. "She's not that pretty. I don't know what he sees in her..." Peeking through the crack in the stall I recognized two women from our table... and they were talking about... me? I was horrified. My first instinct was to just hide in the stall until they left, but they kept applying make-up and chatting. I finally pulled myself together. I hadn't done anything wrong - why was I hiding?

They looked appropriately shocked as I emerged and washed my hands. When I left the ladies' room I went to the payphone and called Lisa to tell her the story. And fortunately after talking with her the whole thing just seemed funny. (Mortifying, certainly - but also funny.)

Everyone's entitled to their opinion. And people gossip - that's just what we do. It would be better if we didn't - and sometimes we make an attempt to be our 'better selves'. But for when we're not, it's always smart to stick to 'the rule.'