I realize I'm becoming pedantic.
It's not from desire to boast. Or to try to make people feel bad about their levels of knowledge. It's because I've grown up being lied to.
Where my uncle is, who my grandfather is, what my mother's experiences have been, what the real reasons for things are. Vietnam, Christmas. All the family secrets, all the family evasions, all the flat out dirty lies which have led me to mistrust people and often prefer to be alone.
So that inaccuracies make me nervous. Inwardly I feel I need a stable representation of reality, some kind of handle to hang on to, like the dirty vinyl handles on a swaying city bus you grip tightly while careening around corners. False statements are stressful. I correct them to keep my balance.
I hope I'm not offending anyone. I want people to like me. Despite depression and despite mistrust I realize I'm part of society. I don't want people thinking of me as intimidating or caustic.
Yet here it is. The more I read, the wider my knowledge, the greater my fields of literary or historical expertise, the more likely I am to correct people when they say things that are wrong. Because they stress me hard when they do.