Take for instance the practice of the common greeting to people whom you know or live in your neighborhood. From my experience growing up in Michigan, annual visits to Tennessee, and living in Seattle, I can tell you that it was the norm in those places to greet people in some fashion when they passed near you. It did not matter whether you knew them or not. You might smile, nod, raise a hand in a wave of acknowledgement, or say hello. That is common courtesy. It is not considered good manners to not acknowledge someone in close proximity to you who has made eye contact with you and greeted you. That is called being standoffish or even rude. It is especially considered rude if your facial expression betrays your annoyance at being greeted. No one is asking you for a conversation, trying to convert you, nor are they trying to sell you something. They are merely being nice by acknowledging your existence. You can tell the non-Texans. They will often initiate the greeting.
Related to the lack of greeting quid pro quo, is the odd looks I get when I strike up a conversation with a stranger. People act surprised and eye me suspiciously when I make a comment to them over a shared experience. I had an early meeting one day this week, and afterwards I decided to go to Hallmark to pick up a card. I arrived at the same time as another woman. The store did not open until 10:00, and it was presently only 9:30. I remarked to the woman in a friendly tone, "Oh no! They don't open for another 30 minutes! I guess I think just because I am up, I think everyone else should be too! Looks like I've got some time to kill." She looked at me like I was absolutely insane and walked away. This is not an uncommon occurrence. Without thinking, I might make a friendly remark to someone in the grocery store, and most will look at me like I have two heads. Just to be clear, I am usually dressed relatively nicely, with hair somewhat neat, and usually wearing some light make up. I do not present as a vagrant, prostitute, nor do I look inebriated, or like a mental patient. If a stranger makes a light comment over a shared experience, the common practice outside of this part of Texas is to either make a comment back in the same vein, or merely smile. Being friendly is not weird. Acting like a person who speaks to you is about to push you into a van and force you to join their cult is weird.
Next on my list of offenses is invasive questions to determine your household income. Everyone knows it is not good manners to flat out ask someone how much they make. Several people I have encountered have found a backdoor to obtain that nugget of information. They will ask, "What does your husband do?" That question may seem innocuous enough, and it would be if I had opened the door to that line of questioning by mentioning my husband or his work, but in the absence of related conversation, it is an irrelevant question with the intent of data mining for one's own curiosity. Asking a woman what her husband does for a living diminishes her contributions to the household. It reeks of an archaic patriarchal ideal of the man being the head of the household. Most people are not trying to make such an old fashioned statement though; the person really only wants to find out your social class and annual income. It is nosy, and it is bad manners. Do not ask a woman what her husband does. She will tell you if she wants you to know.
A few months ago, I experienced the ultimate example of this very thing while I was helping a co-worker. We have never worked closely together, nor have we ever had a conversation beyond basic pleasantries until that day. She soon began to not only question me about what my husband did for a living, but also preceded to inquire where he worked, how long had been there, where did he go to college, what degree did he pursue, and did he graduate. This co-worker has never met nor even seen my husband. I had not mentioned him previously either, other than to say where he was from, which I believe was in answer to an earlier question she posed. When she found out that my husband had stopped short of earning his degree, (I should not have answered that one, but her grilling caught me off guard) she began to cross-examine me about whether or not he has tried to convince my daughter that she does not need college. She has never met my daughter, and I have no idea why she would ask such a question. What parent does not want their child to go to college? He isn't a neanderthal! I felt like I had been thoroughly interrogated by this woman for no apparent reason other than to satisfy her burning curiosity. I barely know her. The strange thing was, she did not ask me where I went to college, my degree, and where I worked previously. Obviously, working with me, she knows how much I earn, I suppose she was only interested in ascertaining my husband's qualifications to get the full picture of our income. That encounter has left me soured on sharing anything of my personal life with my co-workers if I can help it. I can't imagine even family or close friends delving that deep into my business.
Prying into the personal lives of others is not worst misdemeanor I have experienced from my years in Texas. That honor goes to fake niceness. I find it so confusing to listen to people make horrible snarky comments about someone, then turn to the person and be cloyingly and simperingly sweet to the their face. I have never really encountered that before. If you do not like someone, then you are merely polite to them. You do not go out of your way to convince them you are friends. I've noticed that with fake niceness, the southern accent gets more pronounced, the laughter a little louder, and inside jokes with the person are tossed about. Once the unsuspecting person walks away, the tear down begins. Everything from their clothes, their mannerisms, to past indiscretions is fodder for ridicule. Honestly, you do not know where you stand with people once you see how they treat their seemingly close friends.
Since moving Texas, I have felt like an outsider as I do not understand the people here. I do not want to conform and be an unfriendly person, nor do I want to give someone the third degree under the guise of getting to know them better. I can't imagine I would be very good at pretending to like someone that I not so secretly despised. I felt like I fit in Michigan and in Seattle, but I fear I will always be a square peg in Texas. I am still lost in Texas.
