As you might have gathered from the headline, I’m heading into a bit of a soapbox rant. Before I do though, got something  I want to share with you. As you know this past weekend was Valentines. I’m not a big fan of Valentines Day, mostly as it brings around a couple of bitter sweet anniversaries.

On the good side, on this date twenty-one years ago my nephew Maxwell was born. Hey Max, happy birthday dude. On the flipside, on the fifteenth, twenty-one years ago, my late husband had the heart attack that led to his death some eighteen months later.

Sometimes though, I come across something that I really can appreciate and this year is one of them. I’ve been messing about on the website Twitter for a while now. Two of the people I follow on there have quickly become among the group of people who I really enjoy their ‘tweets’. They are @MichaelHyatt and his wife @GailHyatt, who both write blogs that I’ve come to enjoy reading.

On Saturday Michael wrote a post about what he loves about his wife. Gail responded with a post commenting on his post. I really enjoyed the posts, thought you might too. Being a single person, when I’m around married couples, I’m always way more relaxed wtih couples who are close and comfortable in their relationship. I would say from their posts and tweets, Michael and Gail are a couple very comfortable and secure in their relationship.

On to my soapbox I hop.

As you might have gathered from the headline, my rant includes the act of hugging. You know, I’m not a whole lot different from most people. A hug can be a very warm and comfortable exchange between two people. It can convey messages that words would just be trite to say. They have their value and their place.

On the day my mother died in 2000 I went back to dad’s place with him and stayed with him long enough to know that my sister was on her way up. I left before she arrived to make sure that dad had some time to have himself a private cry if he wanted it before my sister and brother-in-law descended. Before I left, I gave him a hug, not something I would normally have done.

Later my sister told me that dad had told her that lots of people hug but when Patti does, it means something. I was pleased to hear that, the hug was meant to mean something to him. It meant I loved him and it was going to be okay. I was with him the day he was diagnosed with cancer in 2006. I hugged him that day too. That one meant I loved him and what more can you say when you just learned you’re going to lose your remaining parent?

I am a person who tends to be an introvert. That doesn’t mean I’m shy, it means I draw my energy from being on my own rather than being around other people as an extrovert would. Like most people I have varying circles of closeness for those people around me, ranging from 2-3 super close friends to people I just know and lots of degrees in between.

Most people who know me seem to understand that I have a personal space around me that shouldn’t be violated unless I’m ok with that. There are some who decide because they like to be hugged that others, including me, want to be as well.

For the most part, when that mistake is made, I can usually move back, smile and comment that I’m more of a handshake person as I extend my hand to them. For the most part, the other person accepts that and proceeds to respect my space. Then there are those who just think it is their right to drape themselves around me without a by your leave.

I have a newsflash for you people — it is not your right!

What set this rant off was an incident at the Legion on Saturday. The Ladies Auxiliary gathered at our branch for a dart tournament. Our Ladies won the event last year and the right to host it this year. One of the players who arrived is a past officer in the Ladies Auxiliary who apparently decided to let her hair down and really behave badly.

The first time she draped herself around me I tried to move her back and told her that I don’t appreciate that sort of personal invasion. Her response was to try again even as some of the members sitting nearby told her, “you don’t do that to Patti”. She finally wandered off and I could have chalked up her rudeness to not being able to gracefully extract herself.

Well, never make excuses for rude people. Not ten minutes later she returned to the clubroom, makes a beeline for me pushing some thing about hugs that our Ladies were giving their guests and draped herself around me again. This time she was met with my elbow in her chest and a quiet “BACK off!” from me.

She made a third attempt later in the afternoon. By that time I was furious at the gross disrespect she was displaying and she was met by an angry “BACK off before I drop you on your ass!’ before she finally backed off. She doesn’t get it that she has zero right to impose herself on me like that and in fact she committed assault.

hmmmm…. that might not have looked so good “Legion President Decks Visiting Past LA Officer”…. oh well.

For years, most people just accept that is the way I am and keep their distance. For some reason in the last year or so there have been a few who really think they have a right to impose themselves. One has declared that she is ‘going to get a hug out of me if it is the last things she does’ … trust me dawling, it will be since that is your game.  Another informed me publicly that he had made it his personal goal to get me to allow him to hug me. I just as publicly asked him what drove him to be so into personal failure.

For me, when I accept a hug from someone, it usually means that person has started to move into the circle of trusted friend. There are currently 2-3 people with whom I exchange very heartfelt hugs with when we are together. Two of them know more about me than anyone else alive. They’ve earned my trust and my faith in them.

There are others who I’ve become comfortable enough with that when the situation warrants ‘communicating’ with a hug, I’ll do so. One of those currently in that circle right now is going through a really rough time. In addition to her own health issues, her husband is seriously ill and recently she lost a really close friend very suddenly. When things seem the darkest, I’ve quietly taken opportunities to give her a hug and let her know I’m there for her.

So no, I’m not a cold person. However, if you make it your life work to extract from me what you don’t have a right to, it will be a frosty Friday in hell before I’ll relent.

When my sister was teaching her children that they had dominion over who touched them and how, we got into the habit of saying to them “I have a hug for you” which showed them they had the choice to accept or not. It was always a nice warm cuddle for both of us when the child accepted.

That maybe is something we need to remember with each other. Liberties are not yours (or mine) to take but they can be a gift conveyed to us.

soapbox off