Covered in elephant spittle

A friend of mine is an elephant trainer at the Kansas City Zoo. From her stories, I’ve deduced that a person must absolutely LOVE elephants to work this job. If you’ve ever changed a dirty diaper, multiply that by 2,000 and you will have an idea of her daily routine. As her fiancé said, “When she comes home and says things like, ‘one of the elephants had the runs today,’ I just can’t even begin to picture the mess.

Tuesday night she shared another lovely story with us. At work that day, one of the elephants spit on her. Yep, that’s right, just like that annoying boy that sat behind you in 7^th grade, only much, much, much more so. She said her back was turned to the elephant, so when she first felt the wetness she thought the beast had just sprayed some drinking water on her. “She likes to do that sometimes. She’s a jokester.” But then she turned and saw that the elephant hadn’t been drinking, and then she touched the thick, sticky fluid covering her body, and she knew that this wasn’t mere water; it was pure elephant saliva.

How would you have reacted? Yeah, me too. But here’s the thing. My friend said that she had to pretend that nothing had happened. “If we react when she does stuff like that, it’s like a reward, and that encourages her to do it again.”

So I’m thinking, how does a person pretend that weren’t just slathered in elephant spit? That level of nonchalance sounds nearly impossible. Her self-control and tolerance for ick are certainly amazing to behold.

Elephant loogies make me think of Fred Phelps. When his son Nate Phelps spoke in Topeka this past summer, someone asked him what would be the most effective means to discourage Fred and his tribe. Nate responded that if it were possible, the most effective means would be to completely ignore them. Media coverage, outraged crowds, taunts thrown back, all only reward and encourage them.

Now, I’m not suggesting that we always tolerate bad or destructive behavior. A woman in an abusive relationship needs to take action. A teacher with a student who disrupts class, thus hindering the other students’ learning, can not simply ignore the behavior.

I’m talking about all those people in your life and mine that do or say really annoying things to get our attention, push our buttons, make us angry, or disgust us. What happens when we give them attention? It’s a reward, and they are encouraged to continue the annoyance. (By the way, it’s important to acknowledge that all of us at times are the elephant).

So give this a try. Do what my friend did. Turn your back on the elephant, walk away, shower off the spit, and go out and have a beer with your friends. The next day, you may choose to give the elephant another chance, or you may choose not to. Me? Well, I’ll order another pint then sleep on it.