A literal girl in a figurative world

Dear Miss Kitty,
Why isn’t there an Easter Chicken? It makes no sense that a bunny leaves candy Easter eggs.
Anna, SANTA BARBARA
Dear Anna,
What makes no sense is thinking that anything of a candy-like nature comes out of either a chicken or a bunny.

Dear Miss Kitty,
Last month my BF’s parents were in town and (without my knowledge) they decided to co-sign a loan for him and he bought a house. I found out when he said he had a surprise he wanted to show me. His new house which just closed a 60 day escrow! It is hard for me to be happy for him since he had promised me for 3 years that we would buy a house together. Now I am wondering if he ever really meant it. This is a big deal to me since I don’t take broken promises lightly. Is breaking a promise the same thing as lying?
C.C., SANTA BARBARA

Dear C,
It is hard to be a literal girl in a figurative world isn’t it? In so many effortless ways we can be in touch with the ones we love. We instant message, text, and even slow down and call once in a while. With all that glorious communication available, it still seems that too much gets lost in translation. In other words, when it comes down to putting your money where your mouth is, too many people use depreciating dollars instead of the gold standard.

Besides carpel tunnel, one of the side effects of an instant-information world is the lost ability to ponder at leisure. To sit back and think, peruse and mull over possibilities before we use our immature emotional megaphones and blurt them out. In the very early days of dating, much gets said (and done) that would be better served by waiting. We tend to forgive such trespass since it is hard to see anything while wearing rose colored glasses. Infatuation is its own defense.
However deep into the job description of a serious relationship, a promise said and heard should be a promise kept. So does a promise become a lie if it is not honored? Although it sounds, looks and feels like the mother of all lies, a broken promise is not the same thing as a lie. Once and for all (since most allow too much wiggle room for this 3- lettered criminal), let us nail down what a lie really is - a known deception made to cover up, avoid or modify the truth.

Although breaking a promise can be a foul thing to do, it isn’t a lie since there wasn’t deceit when the original promise was being made. 50% of all current marriages end in divorce. Do you think half the brides and grooms had a finger crossed behind their back? Should the ceremony include a polygraph test? No, because when those promises were made, there was a sincere intent to love, honor and cherish. Certain golfers not included.

What a broken promise does is trigger the same heart- stopping emotional response as a lie. Betrayal is lemming country. Without warning life as one has known it is running away as fast as it can - right off a cliff. During the descent, the fallout is brutal. Questions come as fast as the cold air rushing up to meet and greet. Of course, the question of lying is at the top of the list. Why wouldn’t it be? There is nothing like a taste of incongruence to make us think the entire buffet might be poisoned.

Darling C, Boys and Girls, although we have clearly identified that a broken promise is not a lie, it takes the same type of emergency CPR (Caring Personal Relating) as if a lie had been told. To revive your relationship via CPR, an upfront Q and A with Mr. Casa Nuevo in required regarding what happened, what is happening and what will happen if a promise is shirked in the future. Remember that four-year-old Easter egg in the back yard? A word to the wise: don’t make a promise lightly- because everything hidden eventually shows up.
Have a naughty day!