What Does It Mean to Be Too Nice?
I’m 15 years old, and I’m at a cemetery standing next to the only other two people anywhere in sight — my mother and my grandmother. It’s cold and I can see my own breath dance in the air when it exits my body. I pull the zipper of my coat a few inches higher to keep the air at bay. I don’t want to be here. I’ve not seen grandfather’s gravesite since the day of his funeral. Walter Lee Jones. Born: 1932. Died: 1984.
The day that my grandfather died, my grandmother couldn’t be consoled. Standing over his grave now, tears stream down her cheeks and settle into the cracks and crevices of her old, leathery face. She doesn’t have a tissue, so she wipes tears away with the back of her hand. I’m numb. I don’t feel anything. And, I don’t cry because I’m not sad. As I watch my grandmother cry tears of deep sorrow, I only feel cold, bitter and angry as one thought enters my mind: Grandma, Walter Lee Jones was not kind to you. He lived his life in a drunken stupor and he cruelly beat you with his fist for almost 35 years. DON’T. CRY. FOR. THIS. MAN!
Two years later, memories from that day at the cemetery enter my mind as I sit with my grandmother watching one of her favorite television shows. A female character has just told her friend that she doesn’t want to date a male character on the show because he is, you know, too nice. “Lot a wiman say dat,” my grandmother says in her deep Mississippi drawl. “They ont like mens who is too nice. Ain’t no such thang. No man cain’t eva be too nice,” she says. I didn’t agree with her then, and I don’t agree with her now. There is such a thing as too nice. My grandma was too nice to her husband … and he wasn’t nice enough to her.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: In dating and mating, I think it’s always important to like (and to be nice to) yourself more than you like (or are nice to) the other person. So, if you’re nicer to them than you are to yourself or if you’re nicer to them than they are to you, that’s too nice.
March 26th, 2006 at 10:35 am
I’m so sorry that your grandmother had to go through that.
She’s lucky to have such a caring granddaughter. ;)
March 26th, 2006 at 11:18 am
Your explanation of “too nice” is wonderfully accurate. After almost 39 years of life (18 years of those dating), I’ve never put those pieces together in that order. Thank you for sharing that.
March 26th, 2006 at 9:16 pm
I agree with your grandmother: there is no such thing as too nice.
I think that we tend to equate being a doormat to being nice. When you are being nice to someone to make them like – or love – you, that’s not too nice, that’s sad. It’s not respectful to yourself or the other person. When someone does this, they aren’t being true to the other person, because that isn’t really who they are. Putting on a fake face isn’t being nice, it’s being deceitful.
Doing nice things – nicer things than you do for yourself – for someone you are in a serious relationship with is part of love. It’s an outward expression on a private, inward feeling. What you might think is “too nice” is true adoration.
Perhaps the really truly nice things don’t have a place in the first several months of a relationship. Maybe the “too nice” actions of someone in that time are a sign of someone being less than honest rather than actually being too nice.
Interesting topic.
March 26th, 2006 at 9:25 pm
I think it’ll come as no surprise to anyone that I’ve never been accused of being ‘too nice’.
March 26th, 2006 at 10:30 pm
I understand what you mean, Stolie.
But I’ve not been operating like that when I have been judged “too nice.” It has always seemed that women I have gotten that are used to dating more self-absorbed guys and aren’t comfortable with someone who isn’t a complete ass most of the time.
For example, my most recent ex, “The Niece,” wanted to pick fights all the time. I wouldn’t bite. There’s just some stuff that isn’t worth getting angry over.
March 26th, 2006 at 11:41 pm
Stolita is straight up gangster!
March 27th, 2006 at 1:55 am
Hanuman: Thank you. :)
Howard: You’re quite welcome.
MamaChristy: I agree (selfless love = doing really nice things and stuff) and disagree (“too nice” = deceit).
Jay: Really?!?! ;-)
Raymond: It seems that finding a good “match” can be difficult.
Notorious B: Yes, indeed I am. ;-)
March 27th, 2006 at 7:12 am
“Be nice to yourself.” Sounds like good advice. In the same vein as “you need to learn to love yourself, because if you don’t love yourself, how can you expect anyone else to”
Don’t know where I got that. Been spouting AA garb all week….. After years of growing up and been forced to listen to my Dad’s AA tapes – it seeps out at the strangest times!!
March 27th, 2006 at 7:19 am
That’s VERY good advice!