My friend Sarah will not drink from the top or bottom of the milk container; I only sweeten my coffee with honey which tends to settle at the bottom which means Sarah will not drink the last of my coffee. Fine by me, it's a cute quirk that I happen to enjoy because I like the extra sweet final gulp. Bobby, an acquaintance of mine is deathly afraid of mustard -- interesting I thought, but harmless no doubt. Harmless until I sat between him and the stranger who ordered a chili dog with extra mustard at the last baseball game I attended. As soon as that dog went sliding past his nose, Bobby flipped back over his seat kicking me in the face and cracking his head on the concrete. A perfect double play -- we were both out. Two stitches and a black eye later I no longer thought of Bobby's fear of mustard as cute or harmless. Certain things about a person make them interesting such as Sarah's unwillingness to take that first swig of milk. Other things make a person dangerous such as fear of condiments. I wonder, do all quirks harbor a secretly potential dark side? Should I fear the idiosyncrasies in others or accept them at face value? When does a pleasant eccentricity become a painful neurosis?
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