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if you thought somebody was making a mistake, would you tell them? «well, of course» you say. «of course i would. i am a reasonable person. that's what reasonable people do - reasonable things.» but in reality, what we tell each other about impending mistakes could be charted on one of those quandrant charts with low to high investment on the x and low to high outcome on the y. or, something like that.

if your best friend is shopping for a car, and she's got a couple kids so she needs a safe car that gets good gas mileage, and she comes and tells you that she's picked out the perfect car and it's an old jeep cj-5 and yeah it needs some work and yeah there's only 2 working seatbelts and one's for the driver, but see she can bungee in kid #2 using kid #1's seatbelt just-like-this and... and... you are thinking that's a death trap and she can't afford the maintenance much less the gas, would you tell her? would you tell her even if she would be very disappointed because she really wanted the jeep and you know all she's going to hear is "you're a bad mother" when that is not what you are saying at all? would you tell her?

if you are on a road trip together with your cousin who is diabetic and you stop in the 7-11 (pronounced "semalem") to get a snack and 'cuz' is pretty thirsty and is looking for a good choice and he's selected a gatorade and he's showing you what a great choice he made because gatorade is a real thirst quencher and it's not a soda but you know gatorade is filled with HFCS and you're maybe not exactly sure, but you think maybe that won't be good for a diabetic and you're not quite sure 'cuz' knows that there's HFCS in the gatorade and you'd really like to be sure that 'cuz' knows what he's doing... would you tell him? would you tell him even if you know he's going to get angry because he always gets angry any time you mention his diabetes and he tells you that you just don't understand because YOU don't have diabetes and he has to live with it every day and what do you know anyway and he never should have come on the trip with you, you idiot! would you tell him?

if you're shopping with your dad for a gift for your mom and he's about to purchase a pair of gloves that are brown and you know for a fact that she wanted gloves that are black, so you can see he's making a mistake there, and it's a mistake you can prevent, would you tell him? would you tell him even if you knew that he really prefers your mom to wear brown and he thinks she's really pretty in brown even though he can't bring himself to tell her because it's black she really likes so the gift that will make her happy is the black gloves but the one that will make him happy is the brown... would you tell him?

if you have gone to dinner with your in-laws and your mother-in-law is thinking about ordering the potato soup and you have had this potato soup here at this restaurant and you know it sucks giant donkey dongs, and say for instance that you happen to like your mother-in-law and you care about her happiness, would you warn her about the soup, tell her that getting it would be a mistake? would you tell her if your reputation in the family is that you've already been everywhere and done everything and it's pretty much a standing joke that you are going to tell your story about when you did this or that, and your nickname is "band camp" and she probably won't even heed your advice but you do really know this soup would be a mistake, would you still tell her?

if you saw a stranger who was a guy about to go into a ladies restroom, which might be funny except this is an old guy with a cane and he maybe is trying so hard just to coordinate the walking and the not falling down that he's got nothing left over for reading signs that he can barely see thru his thick glasses, would you help him avoid this mistake? what if the you just saw him loudly reprimand someone who tried to help him navigate around a display of china tea cups and he told that other helpful stranger that he didn't need anyone's help, that he was independent and completely capable of taking care of himself and kids these days have no respect! would you warn him he's about to make a mistake?

well?

would you?