The Perils of Politeness continued...

I took the tram to my last court hearing of the year on ‘Black Eye Friday’ 2013, the reason being that I was due to be going to the pub straight after work later that day, so had left my car at home. It was whilst standing on the packed tram with my head down and my hefty files under one arm, my other arm clinging to a pole for stability so as not to knock one of the unsavoury individuals within all too close proximity, that I was about to have a further lesson in the perils of politeness. I knew that I was likely to be on the tram for a lot longer than most, I usually was, I would be taking it right into the city centre, through atleast eight stops. Therefore, my objective was to try and find a seat as soon as one became available, it would have to be a lone seat, my legs were too long and my baggage too cumbersome to fit into a twin seat with another person. After a couple of stops such a seat became available, I waited to see if the several people between me and the seat wanted to take it first, nobody made the move, so I carefully made my way through and sat on top of my heavy long coat with my files falling either side of me. Once the tram got underway again, a young lady nearby with red hair and Dr Martin boots said to nobody in particular, at conversational volume, ‘I was going to offer that seat to the elderly man over there.’ I looked around the carriage quickly, and sure enough, diagonally across from me, on the other side of the doors was an elderly gentleman, he was bent over both hands firmly clasped around a pole. He was surrounded by a number of taller people, and I had missed him completely as a result. I immediately leapt to my feet and agreed that the elderly gentleman should have the chair. The young lady repeated in the direction of the elderly man, ‘I was going to offer it to him.’ I agreed that she should do so, and got out of the way. Nothing then happened, the young lady was obviously relying on the elderly gentleman having already heard her, and for whatever reason, possibly embarrassment, was not going to do anything more, like address him directly in the first person. I noticed that the elderly chap was packing a hearing aid in his facing ear and had his head down, so I came forward and suggested I asked the chap instead, I gently tapped him, then gestured towards the empty seat and offered it to him, as I did so, the young lady said over me, ‘I was going to offer him that seat.’ The old man was grateful and shuffled over to take the seat. In attempt to be nice and acknowledge the young lady’s generosity of spirit, I said to her, ‘good spot by the way.’ She turned, scornfully tutted, and said with hostility, still without looking me in the eye, ‘that is because I've got manners, manners cost nothing.’ I backed away quietly and didn't respond. A couple of stops later, the tram still pretty packed, my head hung in sleepy meditation, the young lady was readying herself to disembark, I noticed this and rouse myself to make as much space for her to get passed as was possible. As the young lady made her way past me, with ample room to spare she made a point of saying loudly, ‘excuse me please,’ her face contorted with disgust for me. As she wondered off with her head held high, she was of the firm belief that I was an arsehole and that she was a saint. I thought on this for some time afterwards, before concluding that if she was indeed a saint, she would have had the inclination, the vision and empathy not only to have not so hugely miss-judged me, but not to have behaved so self righteously about it, and that those were in fact the only acts of bad manners committed.