I used to carpool with my manager where I worked. He was very good at working with people. He used to say, "If you laugh, it puts everyone at ease."
Who said, "If I were two faced, would I be wearing this one?"
I know I'm going to have those moments where I forget what I started to say or can't think of the right word to say. So I laugh and pull out one of the quotes I have ready for these situations.
Oh man, I'm having a senior moment ...
Of all the things I've lost, I miss my mind the most.
I forgot what I was going to say. The hard drive access time just isn't what it used to be. I'm sure it'll come back in a bit."
I don't have great social skills to begin with, so these give me a little "social space" when I need it.
A couple of other things I like - if I don't want to deal with someone's lack of understanding or insensitivity to my invisible illnesses, I just interrupt with - what was it that Ogden Nash used to say? "Who needs a physician when every friend is a diagnostician?"
Recently I had an appt. with a cardiologist. I was trying to give him my back ground med info. I have some CFS and some Fibro type things like tender points and occasional flares. He started in on the "I don't believe in ... ". I didn't want to listen to his narrow minded, outdated, uninformed ... stuff, so I just cut him off by saying, "Let's just aggree to skp the whole "Unexplained Medical Symptons" discussion." He got the message - I understood all the issues and didn't have any interest in his opinion. I was quite pleased with myself cause sometimes the cogs turn slowly.
While i was writing this, the kid came in and wanted to talk. She had a traumatic day yesterday. I started to say something but she talked about something else. Then she said, "What were you going to say?"
"I'm having a senior moment. Maybe it will come back."
"The senior moment?"
Sorry to run on. Hope it's not too boring. Guess I needed to write this.
Oh ... before I have another senior moment - the quote at the start of this post was Abraham Lincoln's. If he could see some humor in himself, maybe we can too?