Neverisms Read online

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  Friend or no, envy is an overwhelming emotion.EUBIE BLAKE, legendary composer & musician

  Never trust the bureaucracy to get it right.MCGEORGE BUNDY

  This was the second of six “lessons in disaster” that Bundy learned as he reflected on—and later learned to regret—his role in crafting the military strategy that resulted in the Vietnam War. Bundy’s reassessment was reported in Lessons in Disaster: McGeorge Bundy and the Path to War in Vietnam (2008), by Gordon M. Goldstein. As national security advisor to JFK and LBJ from 1961 to 1966, Bundy was an outspoken “hawk.” In the decades after the war, though, he had a change of heart. One additional lesson that Bundy learned was also beautifully expressed: “Never deploy military means in pursuit of indeterminate ends.”

  Never trust a woman who says: “I’m a woman’s woman.”JULIE BURCHILL

  Burchill, a well-known British columnist added: “It means they incorporate all the base elements of femaleness: they want to be the thinnest girl, get the best boy, and have a better outfit.” Her observation suggests a number of spin-offs, including, “Never trust a man who says, ‘I’m a man’s man.’ ”

  Never trust a man who parts his name on the side.HERB CAEN, on J. Edgar Hoover

  Never trust a skinny ice cream man.BEN COHEN

  In 1978, Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield, childhood friends from Long Island, cofounded the Vermont-based Ben & Jerry’s ice cream company. Cohen’s motto was undoubtedly inspired by the familiar culinary quotation, “Never trust a skinny cook.” The message behind the skinny chef line, which first appeared in the mid–1970s, is that food prepared by such a chef is so bad that even the chef refuses to eat it. Joan Rivers also offered a spin-off when she said, “Never trust an ugly plastic surgeon.”

  Never trust a man who speaks well of everybody.JOHN CHURTON COLLINS

  Never trust a man who,

  when left alone in a room with a tea cozy, doesn’t try it on.BILLY CONNOLLY, in Gullible’s Travels (1983)

  Never trust a man with short legs—brains too near their bottoms.NOËL COWARD, from his 1935 play Red Peppers

  Never Trust a Naked Bus Driver JACK DOUGLAS, title of 1960 book

  Douglas was one of the best-known gag writers of his era, writing for Jack Paar (for more than twelve years), Bob Hope, Red Skelton, Jimmy Durante, and George Gobel. His 1959 My Brother Was an Only Child was the best-selling humor book of the year.

  Never trust a man who says, “Don’t struggle.”JENNY ECLAIR, from her comedy routine

  Never trust a man who, within five minutes of meeting you,

  tells you where he went to college. ESQUIRE MAGAZINE EDITORS, in The Rules:

  A Man’s Guide to Life (2005)

  Other Esquire rules for men appear in other chapters of this book, but here we feature the best of their never trust rules:

  Never trust a man with two first names.

  Never trust a man named after a body part.

  Never trust a man who uses nautical metaphors.

  Never trust an act of civil disobedience led by a disc jockey.

  Never trust a man who owns a video of his middle school musical.

  Never Trust a Man Who Doesn’t Drink W. C. FIELDS, title of a 1971 anthology

  of Fields’s quotations

  Never trust a woman who says she likes football

  until she demonstrates the ability to eat a plate of hot wings clean.JESSE FROEHLING, citing an adage

  This appeared in a Seattle Weekly profile of thirty-two-year-old Elise Woodward, the only female host at KJR, Seattle’s all-sports radio station. Froehling, who concluded from his research that Woodward was a “guy’s gal” who could be trusted, titled his article: “A Fabulous Sports Babe Who’s Actually a Babe.”

  Never Trust a Cat Who Wears Earrings DAN GREENBURG, title of 1997 book

  Never trust a man who says, “I just want you to be happy.”KIM GRUENENFELDER, in her 2009

  novel A Total Waste of Makeup

  In advice to her great-grandniece, the novel’s protagonist added: “What he really means is ‘I just want you to be happy—so I can get whatever it is that will make me happy.’ ”

  Love your country, but never trust its government.ROBERT A. HEINLEIN, widely attributed, but not verified

  Never trust a man’s patriotism who talks loudly in politics.FREEMAN HUNT, in an 1842 essay

  Never trust a man unless you’ve got his pecker in your pocket.LYNDON B. JOHNSON

  Never trust a smiling reporter.EDWARD KOCH

  Never trust a man who combs his hair straight from his left armpit.ALICE ROOSEVELT LONGWORTH, on Douglas MacArthur

  Never trust a man when he’s in love, drunk, or running for office.SHIRLEY MACLAINE

  Never trust a weeping man.DOUG MARLETTE

  Marlette offered this thought in a 1993 Esquire magazine issue on “60 Things Every Man Should Know.” His point was that, in an age of psychobabble and talk-show therapy, genuine feeling has been replaced by disingenuous and inauthentic displays of emotion.

  Never trust a person with margarine in their fridge.JOYCE MAYNARD, from a character

  in her 2003 novel The Usual Rules

  Never trust a woman who says she isn’t angry.ANDREW MCCARTHY, as Kevin Dolenz,

  in the 1985 film St. Elmo’s Fire

  “Never Trust a Woman”BRENT MYDLAND, title of song on Grateful Dead album

  Dozin’ at the Knick (recorded in 1990, released in 1996)

  Mydland was the fourth—and longest-serving—keyboardist to play with the Grateful Dead. He joined the group in 1979 and remained until his death in 1990. The key lyric of the song went this way:

  Never trust a woman who wears her pants too tight,

  She might love you tomorrow, but she’ll be gone tomorrow night.

  Never trust a sanctimonious lawyer.PETER A. OLSSON

  Never trust a man who raves about fresh-cooked vegetables.P. J. O’ROURKE

  Never trust a person who has or thinks he has a cause to dislike you.

  He will surely stick you in the back.GEORGE S. PATTON

  Never trust a man who speaks ill of his mother.ENGLISH PROVERB

  I found this proverb in The Salt-Cellars, an 1889 collection of sayings compiled by the American clergyman C. H. Spurgeon. He added this explanatory note: “He must be base at heart. If he turns on her that bore him, he will turn on you sooner or later.” A similar English proverb goes this way: “Never trust a man who speaks ill of his wife.”

  The proverbs of many nations and regions have begun with the words never trust. Here are a few of the best, along with their likely place of origin:

  Never trust a man a dog doesn’t like.(American)

  Never trust a fool with a sword.(Arab)

  Never trust a woman with a man’s voice.(French)

  Never trust a woman who mentions her virtue.(French)

  Never trust a man you have injured.(Spanish)

  Never trust the man who tells you all his troubles

  but keeps from you all his joys.(Yiddish)

  Never trust any friend or servant

  with any matter that may endanger thine estate.SIR WALTER RALEIGH, advice to his son

  about managing household affairs

  Never trust a woman who

  doesn’t have an instant hormonal response to diamonds.KATE REARDON

  Never trust a man who says he’ll never hurt you.CHRISTINE RIMMER, from a character in

  A Home for the Hunter (1994)

  Never trust the food

  in a restaurant on top of the tallest building in town

  that spends a lot of time folding napkins.ANDY ROONEY

  Never trust a man who says he is only a little crooked,

  and that the crookedness is exercised in your interest.THEODORE ROOSEVELT

  This well-known quotation first appeared in Roosevelt’s The New Nationalism (1910). He famously added: “If he will be crooked for you, he will be crooked against you.” Roosevelt has also been credited with this saying
: “Never trust a man who says he will benefit you by pulling down your neighbor.”

  Never trust a husband too far, nor a bachelor too near.HELEN ROWLAND

  Cardinal rule for all hitters with two strikes on them:

  Never trust the umpire.ROBERT SMITH, former president of

  the International Baseball Federation

  Never trust a landlord to make improvements after you have moved in.WES SMITH, in Welcome to the Real World (1987)

  Never Trust a Man in Alligator Loafers DONNA SOZIO, title of 2007 book, subtitled What His

  Shoes Really Say About His True Love Potential

  But there is one thing I can tell you:

  Never trust a man who says, “Trust me.”LOUANNE STEPHENS, to Lolita Davidovich,

  who played the title role in the 1989 film Blaze

  (screenplay by Ron Shelton)

  At the beginning of the film, Fannie Belle Fleming (played by Davidovich) is about to leave her backwoods shanty in West Virginia for a job in the city. As she is packing her guitar to get on the bus, her mother (played by Louanne Stephens) warns, “You gotta be careful of men.” When Fannie Belle says, “Well I thought I was looking for a man,” her mother replies, “Well, you is.” And then she adds, “It’s complicated. I mean, there ain’t too many good ones out there like your daddy. And what you gotta do is . . . well, you just gotta sort it out for yourself.” Mrs. Fleming pauses, thinks for a moment, and then concludes with the never trust admonition above. The saying may have been used before the 1989 film, but I have not been able to find an earlier appearance. The line did begin to show up with great frequency in the 1990s, though. For example, in his 1992 novel Steel Beach, John Varley has a character say:

  Never trust anybody who says “trust me.”

  Except just this once, of course.

  Never trust your memory.BRIAN TRACY, in The 100 Absolutely

  Unbreakable Rules of Business Success (2000)

  Never trust a woman who wears mauve,

  whatever her age may be,

  or a woman over thirty-five who is fond of pink ribbons.OSCAR WILDE

  These words come from the character Lord Henry in The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890). Speaking to Dorian, he adds, “It always means that they have a history.”

  “Never put anything on paper, my boy,”

  my old father used to say to me,

  “and never trust a man with a small black moustache.”P. G. WODEHOUSE, from a

  character in Cocktail Time (1958)

  Never trust a computer you can’t throw out of a window.STEVE WOZNIAK, cofounder (with Steve Jobs) of Apple Computer,

  in yet another thinly veiled swipe at IBM

  seven

  Never Give In. Never, Never, Never, Never!

  Multiple Neverisms

  On October 29, 1941, Winston Churchill visited Harrow School—his alma mater—to address the student body. It was a difficult time for the English people, and Churchill was doing his best to bolster their resolve. The Battle of Britain had taken its toll on the entire population, especially the schoolchildren. After joining the students in the singing of traditional songs, Churchill gave a speech that lasted less than five minutes. No recording devices were available to preserve the speech, but the full text does exist, and it contains some of history’s most famous words:

  Never give in. Never give in.

  Never, never, never, never—in nothing, great or small, large or petty—

  never give in, except to convictions of honor and good sense.

  Never yield to force.

  Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.

  In the second line of the passage, Churchill repeats the word “never” four separate times to emphasize the critical importance of being resolute in the face of overwhelming danger or seemingly insurmountable odds.

  When people feel so strongly about an admonition that a single “never” seems insufficient, they often attempt to express themselves more forcefully by saying “never, never” or “never, ever.” In doing so, they send an advance signal that the advice is particularly strong or the principle is especially important. In his speech at Harrow School, Churchill used a rare quadruple neverism, and his words have never been forgotten.

  Churchill also occasionally offered triple neverisms, including one very special one in A Roving Commission: The Story of My Early Life, a 1930 book that demonstrated his skill as a writer and storyteller:

  Never, never, never believe any war will be smooth and easy,

  or that anyone who embarks on that strange voyage

  can measure the tides and hurricanes he will encounter.

  This passage, a long-time favorite of those opposed to adventurous military policies, enjoyed a resurgence of popularity after President George W. Bush’s decision to invade Iraq in 2003. Churchill continued: “The statesman who yields to war fever must realize that once the signal is given, he is no longer the master of policy but the slave of unforeseeable and uncontrollable events.” Then, after mentioning “ugly surprises, awful miscalculations,” and other things that can go wrong, he concluded: “Always remember, however sure you are that you could easily win, that there would not be a war if the other man did not think he also had a chance.”

  Churchill’s triple neverism about warfare is certainly memorable, but it’s not nearly as famous as one that appeared in a famous 1960 book, later made into an equally famous 1962 movie. I’m sure the words will be familiar to you:

  Never, never, never, on cross-examination ask a witness

  a question you don’t already know the answer to.

  The words come from Jean Louise “Scout” Finch, the narrator of Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird and the daughter of a small-town southern lawyer named Atticus Finch. The role of Finch was played by Gregory Peck in the film, for which he won an Oscar for Best Actor. After adding that this legal maxim “was a tenet I absorbed with my babyfood,” Scout warned, “Do it, and you’ll often get an answer you don’t want, an answer that might wreck your case.”

  Later in the chapter, you’ll find a few more triples, but they are far exceeded by the number of double neverisms. They come from every sector of life:

  Never, ever backstab.RICHARD CARlSON, in his 1998 book

  Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff at Work

  Unless you are disabled,

  never, ever park in a handicapped parking spot.P. M. FORNI, in The Civility Solution (2008)

  Never, ever give up on sex.DR. RUTH WESTHEIMER

  In most double neverisms, the words are repeated at the beginning of the observation. But in some cases, you’ll see the word appear at both the beginning and—emphatically—at the very end of the admonition, as in Never drink and drive. Never! H. L. Mencken chose this approach in a 1948 interview in which he said he never had any problems with alcohol because, early in life, he had formulated three rules that were “simple as mud.” The first one was:

  Never drink if you’ve got any work to do. Never.

  Mencken then laid out the other two rules in the traditional manner (the italics are mine): “Secondly, never drink alone. That’s the way to become a drunkard. And thirdly, even if you haven’t got any work to do, never drink while the sun is shining. Wait until it’s dark. By that time you’re near enough to bed to recover quickly.”

  Winston Churchill also used a before-and-after approach in the concluding line of an oft-quoted observation about facing danger:

  One ought never to turn one’s back on a threatened danger

  and try to run away from it.

  If you do that, you will double the danger.

  But if you meet it promptly and without flinching,

  you will reduce the danger by half.

  Never run away from anything. Never!

  With some multiple neverisms, the key words appear at the conclusion of a longer passage. In a 1961 Sunday Times piece titled “Consider the Public,” Noël Coward warned “New Movement” playwrights abou
t the danger of letting their political views or sense of morality take precedence over their artistic talent. Suggesting that the theater is primarily a place for entertainment, he wrote:

  Consider the public. Treat it with tact and courtesy.

  It will accept much from you if you are clever enough to win it to your side.

  Never fear or despise it.

  Coax it, charm it, interest it, stimulate it,

  shock it now and then if you must,

  make it laugh, make it cry, and make it think, but above all . . .

  never, never, never bore the living hell out of it.

  In the rest of the chapter, you’ll find nothing but multiple neverisms. They come from all kinds of people and from every sector of life. And they’ve all been offered by people hoping their words will never, ever be misunderstood.

  Never, ever leave a hickey.

  That little trick grew really old after junior high school.DAN ANDERSON & MAGGIE BERMAN, in their 1997

  bestseller Sex Tips for Straight Women from a Gay Man