It’s the Most Dangerous Time of the Year
Ben Franklin once said that “guests, like fish, begin to smell after three days.” I am certain that my wife and I once smelled like three-day-old fish to some of our best friends. We had driven many hours to visit them and had decided to stay for four days. They insisted we sleep at their house instead of a hotel. We accepted. Since we’d always had a good time together, we anticipated a tremendously fun visit. It was, for two days. But by the third morning, we had begun to prove Franklin right. Their kids seemed tired of our presence and resentful of the disruption to their routines. We felt like mooches. Conversations were brief and strained. A few of us were attempting to get work done on laptops instead of enjoying each other’s company. What had happened?
According to Harvard psychologist Dan Gilbert, our imaginations had fooled us. In his book, Stumbling on Happiness, Gilbert explains how our brains fill in details. He uses the example of a party:
