You're Never Too Old to Be Embarrassed

There really is nothing quite like the feeling you get when you realize you've coasted through six hours of your day with a giant chunk of food in your teeth. Of course, the intensity of that embarrassment is proportional to the sum of how many people you've interacted with during that time, how often you have shown your big "toothy" smile, and the percentage of how confident you are that there is absolutely nothing amiss about your appearance.

After a long stretch of carefree, nothing-in-my-teeth days, I arrived home yesterday after a particularly tiring day of work and class. As I walked into the bathroom to take my jewelry off and put it away, Wes said something funny - which made me laugh - and I happened to catch a glimpse of my teeth in the mirror. My heart sank; there it was. A huge. Piece. Of parsley.

I immediately became embarrassed as I reflected on all of the day's wide-mouth grins and belly-laughs that caused me to unwittingly display this stray chunk of vegetation lurking in a crevass between two of my front teeth. I have to admit, I was a little angry. After all, I had been in close proximity to co-workers, fellow students, and strangers wandering the halls of OSU-Tulsa; yet, not a single person bothered to alert me to the parsley's presence. Surely, someone must have seen it! That got me thinking.

This experience raises an interesting question about social protocol. Should we, as good citizens, give another person the courtesy of cluing them in when they are unknowingly in a potentially embarrassing situation? Or, would it be better to avoid what will likely be a painfully awkward moment by keeping mum?

Here's my philosophy:
Sure, it can be uncomfortable when someone tells you that something about your appearance is out of place - you have a brown stain on the seat of your pants, you have food in your teeth, there's a foreign object dangling from your nose, a stream of toilet paper is stuck to your foot, and so on. However, wouldn't it be better to encounter that discomfort with one person rather than with every person you see for the entire day because you are blissfully unaware that people are wondering if you have mold growing between your teeth? The former seems much more sufferable than the latter.

So, committ a random act of kindness - give someone the memo when they are subject to humiliation by means of something that could be completely avoided. Wouldn't you want it done for you?