Do You Really Want to Know?

It was a simple question I’ve been asked thousands of times. "I haven’t seen you in ages" my long-distance friend home for a visit gushed enthusiastically "HOW ARE YOU?"

"How Are You?" she said. Three words and nine letters that elicit a mini panic attack each time I hear them. A reluctant "good doobie" from way back when, I try my best to be honest in thoughts and actions whenever possible. Partly because it’s the right thing to do, partly because its too hard to remember fibs, but mostly because I seem to have been born with an extra large guilt complex that won’t let me rest if I try to be anything but honest. A guilt complex so bad that as a young child preparing for confession, I kept a list of everything I did wrong- including the horrible sin of walking by my Nana’s house without saying hello- only to find out the light in the confessional goes off when you kneel, leaving me list-less and sinful. But I digress.

I try to be honest, but not brutally so where I blurt out hurtful facts just because they are true and need to be said. In fact, I’ve become adept at massaging the facts to appease my honest nature without leaving a trail of hurt feelings along the way. "Don’t I look like I lost a ton of weight?" my happy co-worker asks as she twirls around proudly displaying something I’m just not able to see. I smile and say "Wow… look at you!" which she takes as agreement and leaves happily.

Behind her comes a friend who just scored an unexpected invite to a hip party after work.
"Does this outfit make me look like an old fart?" "Define old fart" I respond realizing it’s a question that demands a Yes or No answer I’m unable to give at this moment. "I knew you’d tell me the truth… I’m going to go home and change first" she laughs. And it dawns on me how ironic it is that in my attempt to be truthful I have become an expert at not answering the question at all, a trick men learned years ago.

Its our own fault as women that men have been trained to sidestep such Yes or No landmine questions as "Does this make me look fat?" or "Does my haircut look ok?" Forgetting this deep-rooted self-defense mechanism, I ask my fiance a question I expect a truthful answer to: "Do you like my hair better short or long?" Staring at me as if I was cross-examining him in a court of law, he gingerly responds "Whichever way you like it is good." So much for honest feedback.

But of all these questions we ask on a regular basis, it is still "How Are You?" that trips me up every time. Synonymous with "Hello" and intended more as a greeting than a real question, it certainly does not require the soul-searching reflection I’ve come to give it. And as kind as the check out attendant at the grocery store is, I’m sure she doesn’t want a truthful answer when she says "Hi, how are you" in a sing songy voice while she scans my can of soup with the grace of a conductor’s wand. For a moment I’m tempted to answer ‘I’m obsessed with my family’s health, scared about what is going to happen if the next generation doesn’t read newspapers, and worried about a new mole that looks alot like photos I’ve seen of possible skin cancer. And you?’ but instead I chuckle "Do you really want to know?" expecting this to be a controversial answer. Instead she hums back "Great" apparently assuming my answer had been "good", which I understand is the preferred response of 99.9% of the human race when asked how we are. So why does this question haunt me so much, and why is it so difficult for me to spit out "good" even if it couldn’t be further from the truth? And does anyone really want to know how I am?

"HOW ARE YOU?" my friend asks me with her bright smile and kind eyes that just barely hide the pain I know she feels over her husband’s sudden illness. And at that moment I realize that for the same reason I know how she truly feels, she knows how I feel as well. We politely ask the question, but we already know the answer. "I’m hanging in there." I answer honestly. "Me too, my friend" she responds with a hug, "Me too."