My friend insists that I should say “hello”
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I'm not sure she understands the complexities of such a word, or its connotations in certain contexts. Quite aside from its origins in the early nineteenth century and subsequent widespread adoption as a result of the rise of the telephone, it is far more than a simple greeting. A poorly considered "hello", unleashed at the wrong time, could invite conversation. One may as well experiment with the pogo stick method of land mine detection.
It's not the "hello" that concerns me. It's just a word; its two delicate syllables conjoined by tapping the tongue against the soft palette and pursing the lips. The word itself holds no particular fear. It is neither hard to pronounce, nor complex in meaning. It's what comes after the "hello" that causes anxiety. The possibilities are endless, and even the good ones are daunting.
An unreturned hello is a lonely word to be released into the wild. It is a word that demands a mate and dies in shame without one. Supposing such a word was uttered for which a response was not forthcoming. How, then, would that word, or its speaker, go on about its business with no bruises to its dignity? What a troubling slight from which the ego must recover!
But suppose instead that the "hello" finds a partner and floats off into the ether to do whatever interjections do once they have been uttered. What next? The beauty of "hello" is its simplicity and the certainty of its placement. It can be used to start anything. But there are no rules for what should fall between that and "good bye". There is no conversation map guiding the inept conversationalist to safety.
How is one to navigate the resulting conversation? Should this be the first meeting between the greeter and the greeted, then an introduction may buy time, but it only delays the inevitable. Sooner or later, no man's land awaits. Formalities aside, once initiated, the act of conversation must be committed. To not do so is almost as bad as not returning a proffered "hello".
What happens next is entirely up to you. Should you be looking to make a good first impression, this is your chance to shine. But how is one to know which words are the shiniest? What if the only words that come to mind are, metaphorically speaking, dull and unpolished? Even if one rehearses the conversation in one's head a hundred times in advance, it only takes an unpredicted response to turn the situation on its head.
Those initial conversations can make or break a relationship. Done well, they can lay the foundation for a long-lasting friendship, business partnership or more. Done badly, the can be difficult to recover from. To consistently survive first contact, one must have 'the knack'. In some situations, my survival is guaranteed. In others, less so.
I dearly envy those who can lead with "hello" and go on to get the girl. Perhaps, one day, I too will have such luck.