Welcome to Faux Pas Avenue

Fortunately, it's not an everyday occurrence. But every once in a while one wishes the earth would open up, turn into a gaping maw and swallow one up with no chance of being regurgitated.

Once every so often we step out of the spotlight known as social grace and plunge headlong into an abyss called embarrassment, a dark sector that perpetually rings the spotlight, forming - not merely a penumbra, but an umbra itself.

This black night-like "umbra region" is where we red-facedly wish to be consigned, given the enormity of our "occasional" mishap down Faux Pas Avenue.

Every one of us has suffered our moment of acute, distressing embarrassment. My own life has a catalogue of them, varying in enormity on the Dilemma Scale.

Somewhere at the top must rank my travel by taxi from Sharjah all the way to the Deira taxi stand, squashed in the back seat with other passengers, a fast-putrefying plastic bag of garbage still clutched in my hand that I was meant to dispose outside the block of apartments.

It so happened that I'd been caught up with plotting a novel and at the same time dreaming of untold millions as agents and publishers bid aggressively for the manuscript.

It was the longest ride of my life and the earth, laughingly, refused to open up.

My wife's colleague in Sydney has had her own peculiar experience.

Being a bit on the reserved side, she'd been told by her mum when growing up that it was important, nevertheless, to mingle with others in a group.

The gist was that "You don't have to be the one singing or dancing, just be present. Look around. You'll find others who are equally reticent. Go up to them, hold out your hand, say hi, introduce yourself and take it from there."

One fine day it became necessary to put mum's advice to practice. Several of her girlfriends were enjoying themselves.

She, left to herself, looked around, and found an equally quiet man sitting nearby.

Off she went, smiled, said hello, and held out her right hand. Then, just before the umbra region closed in, she noticed that the gentleman didn't have a right hand to offer her in return.

And finally, there was Jack's distinctly odd experience. A dreamer and unpublished writer, he got off his train from work one particular evening and walked - head in the clouds - to the car park where, as was the custom, his wife sat in their white Holden Astra, waiting.

A "welcome home" kiss was usually the first thing he received as he heaved his frame into the front passenger seat.

On this day he too was trapped in the bowels of a labyrinthine plot. He had to devise a way of making his main character escape. As he walked the stretch to the car, he suddenly thought he caught the first glimmer of a solution.

Thoughts came tumbling in profusion as his feet neared the white car. Yes, yes! That's how the escape would take place.

He grasped the car door handle, levered it, ecstasy flooding his veins, a smile turning his mouth into a delightfully curved harp string. Mechanically, just as he did every day, he leaned over, angling and aligning his face for the kiss.

The sight that met his eyes caused his blood to freeze.

It was a mouth, yes, but topped by a walrus moustache and a fierce pair of eyes warning, "I'm a mere ten seconds away from beating you up!" And the car was white, sure. But it wasn't his. His wife was in the one parked behind. And his eyes met hers in the rearview mirror just before he leaped free.

Kevin Martin is a journalist based in Sydney, Australia