Bad First Impressions

Off the book, I like to think we can recover from bad first impressions. After all, we've all been there.

The day we woke up too late to shower, or even brush our teeth.
Barking at our toddler in the grocery store, because the 100th "I want" has put us over the edge.
Making a joke within the first few minutes of meeting someone who doesn't have an ounce of understanding that life is too short to not be sarcastic.

How do we recover?

Apologize. Smile. Admit your mistake. Laugh at yourself. Make the right first impression the second and third time around.


But that's off the book.

How many times have you picked a book off a shelf in a store, read the first paragraph and put it back for whatever reason? It didn't hook you. Are you likely to pick it back up? The author can't be there, holding our hand, admitting the mistake, urging us to give it one more try.

I have picked some books back up and opened them to the first page again. But 9 times out of 10, I pick it up because I'm more curious about the idea of the book based on the synopsis on the back. Maybe the first few sentences didn't hook me. Maybe I was wrong to get a bad first impression. Maybe, just maybe the second impression will win me over.

If this is one of the main reasons I pick a book back up, hoping for a better impression, it tells me the synopsis on the back of the book is darn well important.

On the second read, however, if that first opening paragraph still hasn't hooked me, I put the book back on the shelf and move on.

Good thing humans are more forgiving when it comes to first impressions off the book!