{Hugs}

Tonight I was asked to speak at our ward's Young Women in Excellence. The theme was the "Worth of Souls" and the girl who was doing it as one of her YW projects used a whole shoe theme with "soles." Anyway, it was way cute from invites to refreshments and it was so good to be there. Serving in the stake means I don't really get to mingle as much with the young women, so it was a good change.

After I was done speaking I was going around talking to some of the girls and leaders, and as girls do (old and young) there was some hugging. I guess by the time I went out to the car I had some thoughts to process about the many kinds of hugs. For example. I went to hug the gal who organized the whole program tonight and tell her what a good job and we both opened our arms to embrace and we embraced {insert warm fuzzy and encouraging words from me here} and then she begins to rock from side to side. I seriously thought, "Oh, that's swing-y" and I guess I am just not a real swing-y type of hugger.

On my way out the door, one of the mom's walked up to me, with her arms extended (which invites a hug, right?!) and told me I did a nice job and so I thank her and reach in to hug her, but APPARENTLY I was invading some personal space because she backed right back up. I was totally perplexed. Did she want a hug? Did she want a side squeeze? Maybe just a back pat? It was weird and then there was all this awkward body movements trying to get our own space back . . . I'm tellin' ya, it was weird.

And once I got in the car I started thinking, there's got to be some sort of hug etiquette. Like, you don't have to squeeze the guts out of someone; that's kinda rude. Intimate hugs should NOT have back pats [one time Tyler and I totally cracked up because he gave me a back-pat-hug on his way out the door to work. As soon as he patted me and started saying his good-byes, I interrupted him to say, "Did you just pat my back?" I was genuinely surprised. Then it was kinda funny because it is just not how you hug your spouse.] I'm a fan of the side squeeze, especially if I'm not sure the person wants a hug and/or it's someone of the opposite sex. Just put my arm around the shoulder and give a little squeeze; nothing too serious. No grinding with hugs. That's not necessary, (I'm still trying to convince Tyler of that idea, though) but y'all know there have been times where you've thought, "Ew, too much chest there" or "that was a full-body press fer sher!" And how do you hug when one is standing and one is sitting? It's terribly awkward, I think. I tried it tonight, but I ended up totally squeezing the woman's head . . . and it was bad. I'm just gonna throw it out there, that proper hug etiquette would require the sitter to stand.

Anyway, just some random thoughts. And here's a cyber {hug} for each of you that read all that rambling.