“Thank you Sooo much”
When has it become trendy to say this, genuinely and sincerely, when someone’e being helped on some trivial matter?
“Can you pass me some napkins””Yup””Thank you so much”
“What time is it””12:15””Thank you so much”
“Hey can you keep an eye on my stuff for a sec””Sure””Thank you so much”
It’s everyday, everywhere and in nearly every conversation. The richness of the whole phrase make me nausea. It reminds me of the voice in the “next big thing” ads by samsung: “our phone allows us to do amaaaazing things” “the next big thing is here”. Those seemingly friendly and pure tones cannot hide the fact that they’ve been carefully calibrated and crafted, one syllabus a time, to magically convey their messages to the innocent audience. I almost think they’ve consulted a dozen psychologists so that the tones, the messages and the visual can fully grab the weakness of human nature. So are those banners and posters with one or two all-captalized catchphrases. All those Steve Jobs’ type of presentation and visualization are unnaturally unhealthy and deceiving. Nothing can be summarized in one phrase. Everything is complicated. A bold, catching slogan sells good, but it doesn’t actually make the product better, especially when everybody is doing it.
What about a simple and snappy “Thanks” or a formal and less emotionally engaged “Thank you” for such subtlety? I guess you’d never say those two words. What if I saved your life from an angry hippo at the zoo? How are you going to thank me for that? What are you going to say so that I feel I deserve this? I guess you’d run out of your repertoire of expressing gratitude. sometimes it’s not even something grateful. It’s more of a pet phrase, something slipped out of the mouth subconciously to make people feel you care about them, to end a conversation, or just to be cute. Well, perhaps no reason for such behavior.
If over-modesty is a sickness of Asians, over-politeness is becoming a pandemic among modern citizens in America. And both make me nausea, for a long time. Adding a “so much” tag at the end of a sentence doesn’t bond people closer. The over-polite conversation balls tossed back and forth are sarcastically sad, because beneath the web knitted by them, in stark contrast, is the absurd nature of desolated individuality and the lack of understanding and trust. They are just there, all the time, cold, isolated and hard. Anything we try to build in the layer above it not only does not help, but even worse, makes the facts down below opaque and inaccessible.
Say “Thanks” when it should be said. Then feel the warmth and coldness of human connection when it’s presented, truly and transparently.