One of those Old Woman Lessons

The Old Woman tried to pass along to me the many life lessons she gathered through experience or observation over the years.  Some were funny, like how if you wear a blazer, you don't have to iron the back of your shirt.  Others more serious, like how your reputation will dictate the assumptions others will make about you.

If you have generally been true to your word and mostly decent in your dealings with others, you will have slack cut for you when you slip.  However, if you are superficial in your dealings with others, if you are known to twist the facts to fit the fiction you wish were true. . . when you make mistakes, honest or not, the first inclination will be that you acted with intention.  It's kinda hard to see it any other way.

I know this to be true from experience and observation.  Now, I need to go find some young human to try to teach this lesson to, so that they might roll their eyes and learn it the hard way 30 years later.