Have you ever had the experience of thinking, "I should have said such-and-such," or "I wish I had thought of saying such-and-such"? Of course you have; it's a very common experience.
Well, the French have a word for it, l'esprit de l'escalier, which literally means 'the spirit of the staircase'. The idea, presumably, is that you've just left someone's apartment and you've started down the stairs, and you think of what you should have said.
Well, today I thought of something I should have said--a couple of years ago! I know it sounds odd to be thinking of a situation that long ago. If I explained the association, or what triggered the memory, it might make more sense (trust me on this).
What I thought of as what I should have said would have been the perfect putdown to a person who was being obnoxious. It not only would have shut him up, I would have gotten a laugh, I'm sure, from the rest of the people at the table.
It's enough to make you wish you could travel back in time, so that you could have another chance to say what you should have said!
Copyright (c) 2009 by Richard Stein
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