There’s a familiar conversation that happens whenever I go out to eat with certain people in my life. It begins the way most dinner plans do.
“What do you feel like having tonight?”
“Oh, it doesn’t matter.”
“Really, anything is fine.”
“You pick.”
“Whatever’s easiest.”
This is meant to be helpful. It’s offered with the best of intentions. But somewhere around the third “I don’t care,” I begin to suspect that it actually matters quite a bit, because now I’m responsible for choosing a restaurant or meal that satisfies everyone, including the people who claim not to have preferences. If the tacos are too spicy or the pasta not as good as “that other place,” the quiet disappointment will somehow still be traced back to the person who said, “Sure, let’s try that place.”
Maybe indecision isn’t really low maintenance after all.
Enter, My Father
My father, who would have turned 93 this year, belonged firmly to the “don’t be a bother” generation. When he was in his 70s, he had his first surgery. He was nervous about the procedure, but almost more nervous about the attention. Being fussed over was not normally found in his natural habitat. After the surgery, the nurse came in and asked if he’d like something to eat. They had already brought him a Sprite and offered some Jell-O. My father waved the idea away.
“Oh no,” he said politely. “I don’t want to be a bother.”
The rest of us looked at him. This was a man who had just had surgery. Being a bother was literally the point of being in the hospital. The nurse nodded and said she could bring something else like pudding.
“No, I’m fine,” he insisted.
Eventually, I think they brought him chocolate pudding anyway. Hospitals run on a surprisingly simple nutrition plan: pudding, Jell-O, and optimism. But something shifted after that. Because later, when he finally decided he was hungry, my father pushed the call button again and announced that he would, in fact, like something to eat. What followed in our family is now known as The Club Sandwich Incident.
The Club Sandwich Incident
So, my father pushed the call button, and the nurse came in with the same pleasant efficiency nurses everywhere seem to possess.
“Yes, sir? What can I do for you?”
Well. It turned out my father did have something specific to eat in his mind. He sat up a little straighter in the bed and began describing what sounded suspiciously like a full deli experience.
“I was thinking maybe a sandwich,” he said.
The nurse smiled and nodded. So far, so good.
“Maybe toasted whole wheat bread,” he continued. “Really crispy. Maybe rye?”
This might still be manageable.
“And some bacon. Really crispy bacon.”
The nurse’s smile stayed in place, but I noticed her lips now seemed a bit forced.
“Maybe a little turkey,” he added thoughtfully. “Lettuce. Tomato. A little mayonnaise.”
By now the rest of us were sitting around the hospital bed, staring very intently at the floor, the ceiling, the curtain, anything that might prevent us from making eye contact with each other. Because the moment anyone did, we were all going to lose it.
My father, meanwhile, was just getting warmed up. By now the sandwich had moved beyond “a post-surgery snack” and into full architectural planning.
“Maybe not mayo. Do you have any whole grain mustard?” he politely asked.
The nurse then looked at him with the kindest expression imaginable.
“Sweetie,” she said gently, “I’m thinking we’re probably not able to make a sandwich like that just now.”
She handed him a pencil and a paper hospital menu that appeared to suggest his expectations should be adjusted immediately. My father studied it quietly, quickly realizing his choice needed to shift from neighborhood deli to post-surgical nutrition.
My Mom chimed in, reading the menu over his shoulder, “You might like a nice bowl of tomato soup… and look! There’s even a granola bar!”
Eventually, he ordered something far more modest. But the transformation had already begun.
Finding Middle Ground?
Watching my father move so quickly from “I don’t want to be a bother” to outlining a fully engineered club sandwich made me realize something. There is apparently a very fine line between disappearing politely… and requesting a handcrafted deli experience from a hospital nurse who has access to exactly three food groups: pudding, Jell-O, and regret. Most of us are trying to live somewhere in the middle.
We don’t want to be demanding. We don’t want to be high maintenance. Many of us, especially those of a certain generation, were raised to believe that the nicest thing you could say when someone asked your opinion was, “Oh, it doesn’t matter.”
But here’s the problem. It does matter. When someone says, “What do you feel like eating?” and we respond with “I don’t care,” we haven’t actually solved anything. We’ve just handed them the responsibility of guessing what might make us happy while pretending we have no stake in the outcome.
That’s not being easygoing. That’s outsourcing dinner.
I’m starting to think the goal as we get older is not to become the person who designs a sandwich layer by layer for a hospital nurse. But it might be nice to stop pretending we don’t have preferences at all. Somewhere between refusing pudding and designing a deli sandwich is the healthy middle ground of simply having an opinion.
It turns out being a bother isn’t the worst thing in the world. Especially if all you’re asking for is lunch. And if that feels like too much pressure, there’s always chocolate pudding.
Let’s Have a Conversation:
Do you think saying “I don’t care” makes things easier… or does it just shift the work to someone else? Are you more of a “pudding martyr” or a “club sandwich architect”? Has that changed over time? When did you first learn not to be “a bother?” Is that still serving you? What’s one small thing you could start having an opinion about this week without going “overboard” like my Dad?
