Civil? Nah…...go for it….....
“Hello, Tamra….lovely engagement ring…amazing how cubic zirconias look so real these days” :)
“Yes, I saw your big mansion on the hill…so you DID marry that guy with mob connections, right? That’s what I heard a few years ago…”
“Oh…Ally…wow…I didn’t recognize you….weren’t you a lot smaller (or fill in appropriate word) in high school?”
“Hmm….Mary, Mary…hmmm…..Mary….the only Mary I remember was really rude to me…and she had this horrid bleached hair and wore this strange spandex and she made my high school life hell…but her name was Mary…umm….Smith….that couldn’t possibly be YOU, could it? Oh…it IS? Wow, imagine that!”
“Oh, Zinnia…my my my…yes, I heard that you were now the Chairman of the Board for Tippy Toes Children’s Wear…pity that your clothes are all made in China in sweat shops where people are not even paid a living wage…but then again…you never did care about the little guys did you? What an utterly perfect job you have!”
“Why April Gardner….how lovely to see you! I honestly couldn’t tell who it was till you opened your mouth…how could I forget the girl who told the whole town I was necking in the bushes on prom night with Jim Toynbee when I never even knew the guy? You still sound like a bullhorn, what are you doing now? Moonlighting at K-Mart calling out bluelight specials?”
I go through this all the time when I go home…..it’s easy now though. All I have to say is, “I live in England.” And it ends the conversation. In TinyTown of meanie gossipy people——where I grew up——a Land Rover, 2.5 kids and marrying the quarterback don’t have a point of reference for a conversation on England. So, you could try and say you live in Tasmania. And as they search their brains for where that might be to parse a question…just wave and say, “Cheers mate….I’m off….to the South…”
(The names in the above quotes are all made up from my imagination and any relation to people living or deceased is purely coincidental and unintentional…honestly.)