David Spates "Therefore I Am" Published Jan. 20, 2004

No one is "always late" -- people choose to be tardy

With the holidays a faint memory, I'd like to open the floor that we may air our grievances. With so much goodwill toward men and angelic harking going on in the month of December, I thought now would be a more appropriate time to vent my frustration.

So here goes.

To all of the people out there who are habitually late, let me just say that I understand you think you're special, but I'll let you in on a little secret the rest of us know full well -- you're not. Perhaps you think the interpersonal rules of a decent society don't apply to you. They do.

Maybe you think being late is fashionable. It's not. Maybe you want it to appear that you're so busy and so important that you just cannot make it anywhere on time. Hogwash. You're sitting around the house in sweatpants and a T-shirt wasting time watching reruns of "The Jeffersons" just like the rest of us.

Nothing irks me more than people who are habitually late, whether it be during the holidays or whenever.

Do I mean people who are always late? No. There's an important distinction between "habitually late" and "always late." No one, and I mean no one, is always late. We all have duties to perform in our lives, and often those responsibilities involve deadlines. Regardless of who you are, there are some things that you can't be late for. You can't be late for your own wedding. You can't be late for the birth of your children. You can't be late for an IRS audit. You can't be late with a major project at work, one so important that it will impact your salary and job.

Even people who coyly admit to "always being late" won't be late in any of the scenarios I described. So what does that tell us? It means that these people, most of whom seem to almost take pride in being late, choose to be late. They're not "always late," like they say. They could be on time like the rest of us. They choose not to, and that fact that they choose to be late is evidence that they're even less busy and less important than we thought. They make plans to be late! They make an extra effort, and they think it through beforehand. I don't know about you, but I have enough trouble getting through my day in an orderly manner without making special preparations to habitually arrive late to my appointments.

The fact that these people choose to be late brings us to another eye-opening realization. We've established that no one is "always late," and these people simply pick and choose when they will grace us with their punctuality. Therefore can we not assume that if someone is late in meeting you that it's because you're not important enough? After all, these people wouldn't dare be late to a meeting with their boss or a big-time client. They wouldn't be late, as I said, to their wedding or their child's birth or an IRS audit. If the appointment is important enough, they're on time, but if it's just lowly you, they're late.

Thanks. Thanks a lot.

Now, of course, I'm not throwing a blanket over everyone who has ever been late for anything. The perils of modern-day living will make us all late from time to time -- the baby pukes on your shirt, a peanut butter truck jackknifes on the interstate, a circus-like atmosphere inhibits your trek to the courthouse as you respond to sexual molestation charges. We've all been there. Most of us, however, will make a sincere effort to arrive on time, and other folks appreciate the consideration. I know I do.

No one is "always late." "Habitually late" is a much more accurate description, isn't it? "Always late" makes it sound like a naturally occurring defect, as if it's something out of your control, a genetic flaw perhaps. I'm sure a doctor somewhere has classified it as a "disorder" or maybe even a "syndrome." "Habitually late" tells it like it is. It's a habit, a bad one. It's something that can be changed. You can kick tardiness just like you can kick cigarettes, booze or triple cheeseburgers.

Do you know what else irks me? Smarty-pants writers who say at the beginning of their columns that they're going to address grievances, and they then proceed to rail against only one. Yammering on so long about tardiness has now made me, well, late. I apologize. It's nothing against you. Honest.

· · ·
David Spates is a Knoxville resident and Crossville Chronicle contributor whose column is published each Tuesday. He can be reached at davespates@chartertn.net.