There are many ways to respond to chaos.

You can panic.
You can flee.
You can duck under a table and question every life decision that led you to a ballroom full of politicians and chicken entrées.

Or you can be Michael Glantz.

And keep eating your salad.

This past weekend at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, was a night typically reserved for polite roasting, performative laughter, and aggressively average chicken. In this night there was actual gunfire broke out, triggering panic, Secret Service swarming, and a collective loss of everything and nothing.

People dove under tables.

Phones flew.

Dignity? Left the building early, probably around the appetizer course.

And in the middle of all of it, like some kind of Zen master of denial, sat one man. Calm. Centered. Committed.

To his salad.

While the room descended into chaos, he stayed seated, fork in hand, chewing thoughtfully, as if the only real emergency was that the burrata might get warm.

Honestly? Iconic.

When asked later why he didn’t duck for cover like a normal, survival-oriented human, he gave reasons that feel less like an explanation and more like a personality profile:

Bad back
Hygiene concerns (the floor? absolutely not)
General New York “we’ve seen things” energy
And yes, a touch of germ-related aversion that said, I will not be lying on a ballroom floor in formalwear like some kind of emotionally distressed crouton

And I just. I have questions.

But also admiration.

Because psychologically, this is fascinating.

In moments of crisis, most of us default to fight, flight, or freeze.

But there is a fourth, lesser-known response.

Finish your salad.

It’s not denial. It’s not bravery. It’s something far more complex.

It’s control.

Because when the world becomes unpredictable, humans cling to the smallest available certainty. A routine. A ritual. A fork. A perfectly dressed arugula.

It says that I may not control the chaos, but I will control this bite.

And honestly, haven’t we all done some version of this?

Stayed in the meeting while everything was clearly falling apart.
Stayed in the relationship long after the credits should have rolled.
Stayed at the table because leaving would mean acknowledging what’s actually happening.

There’s also something deeply, almost comically human about the hierarchy of concerns here:

Gunfire. Yes, it is concerning.
Secret Service yelling: notable.
Dirty floor: absolutely not.

Priorities matter.

And maybe that’s the real story. Not the politics, not even the danger, but the absurd choreography of human behavior under stress.

Some people run.

Some people hide.

Some people grab wine bottles on the way out (honestly, respect the efficiency).

And some people go viral for refusing to let chaos interrupt their appetizer.

So no, I’m not telling you which political party to avoid.

At this point, I’m more interested in which coping strategy you subscribe to.

Are you a duck-and-cover person?

A grab-the-wine-and-go person?

Or are you sitting there, unbothered, whispering to yourself that Nothing says resilience like finishing what you started.

Even if what you started was a salad in the middle of a crisis.