If I were to meet a king or any other member of royalty, I’d certainly want to know the social rules for appropriate behavior. One thing’s for certain—I would want to know how to address King George VI, especially since his actual first name was Albert. I doubt in any case it would have been appropriate for even his natural mother to have addressed him as “Al”.

I’ll admit to my share of girl watching. When I was in high school, I had a beautiful young neighbor who would occasionally walk by my house. If I was on the porch and saw her coming across the top of the hill, I would go inside the house for fear that I might be put into the awkward position of having to speak to her. I always went inside and traveled from window to window, gazing upon her beauty until she was out of sight. I rode the school bus with her, yet I don’t recall ever having spoken a word to her. I would have died of mortification if I knew she knew that I was so captivated by her beauty.

How many of us old-timers remember the television theme song to Cheers—“sometimes you want to go, where everybody knows your name”? Sometimes we are the exact opposite—we want to go where no one knows anything about us.

I received an email today that gave me pause for thought. Some people worry about being in the “in” crowd. That is usually a place I do not crave, as the admission price is sometimes greater than I wish to pay. According to the thoughts expressed in the email, I may have tried, possibly even succeeded, more often that I thought.