10 Things I Learned in the Past 12 Months

1) For years I thought I really didn't care for the band U2 except, inexplicably, their song "Losing My Religion."  I love that song and could never understand how a band capable of that song could also produce so many other songs I do not like. I was talking to LB about what an anomaly this song is for U2, and he told me that in fact, "Losing My Religion" is by R.E.M. Oh.  

2) You never know what's going to make you lose your audience.  A few weeks ago I saw Viola Davis on Live! with Kelly and Michael, and she told an anecdote about potty training her 2-year-old.  Kelly said something along the lines of, "Don't worry; she'll be using the potty on her own by the time she's 12," and Viola interrupted with, "There's no WAY I'm wiping a 12 year old booty." 

Seeing as how I'm currently wiping an 11-year-old booty, I will most likely be wiping a 12 year old booty. I silently rebuked myself for feeling stung by a flip comment Viola Davis had made which was about her own child--not about me or about special needs children at all.  And yet during that two-seconds of indignation, I picked up the remote and turned the channel.

3) Chin zits really hurt and create an unflattering focal point, but if you can manage to leave them alone they do heal faster.

4) I am becoming more impatient with age, not less so.  Last weekend I walked out of Silver Linings Playbook.  It is a good movie -- I could see that -- and Bradley Cooper is wonderful in it.  It was clear that some sort of redemption was coming if I'd just stuck it out until the end, but there are some things I just cannot bear to see.  And a grown man striking his mother is apparently one of them. 

5) Blocking wires change everything.  No more little peaks along the edges of your handknit blanket from pins.

6) Olive understands almost everything.  If I forget one of the lines of my nightly litany of, "Mommy loves Olive," she will wait expectantly, then say, "ta" after my successful completion.

7) Olive very much dislikes being discussed, and is terribly affronted if we show knowledge of a naughtiness she performed in school that day.

8) There is absolutely nothing that doesn't remind me of my dad.

9) If you come across a knot in your yarn when knitting, it is really and truly imperative that you listen to Elizabeth Zimmerman and never knit a knot because it will indeed untie itself during the blocking of the finished garment and then you'll have a gaping, unraveling hole that says, "Nyah, nyah" at you the entire time you are repairing it with additional yarn.

10) If you want something from someone, you should tell them.  I already knew that.  But what I did not know is that for some people, not answering is their way of saying "no."

 

 

Comments

[Paula]

On #9: Oh crikey, I just did that. Guilt is already raising its ugly head.

On #5: Will blocking wires prevent unraveling?

[Tamara]

#3 killed me! "An unflattering focal point," yes, indeed.

But now, #10. . .hmmm. Is someone stonewalling you? So infuriating.

You're in good form!

[Carys]

#2 I've done that before. Soemthing will be extremely triggery or horrid to me, and I shut the program off/shut the book/etc and never go back to it.

#6 doesn't surprise me in the least. I'm at the *very* verbal side of the spectrum, but I know of a couple people who are non-verbal and only able to communicate via typing. Thank GOODNESS for computers, ipads, and other tech that makes that possible <3

#8: It took quite a while after my mother died before I stopped being reminded of her by everything, wanting to show her things, or wanting to walk into her room to talk to her. And even when it was mostly better, I'd see something she loved and start to buy it for her... But over time it gets to where the love and good memories out balance the grief. *hugs offered*

[ccr in MA]

All good points, but number 10 has me blinking and thinking. Whoa.

By now, almost four years after he died, "everything" doesn't remind me of my father, but it often surprises me "what" makes me think of him. So random!

[ssheers]

Olive was in one of my dreams last night. I don't remember much about it except I had a white kitten in my purse and Olive was standing next to me.

I suspect this is not the first time something from your blog has ended up in a dream of mine.

[kmkat]

Hmm, U2. My husband is of the opinion that the person who wrote the bass line of Mysterious Ways has ensured his place in heaven, no matter what else he does in his life. I myself am inordinately fond of the line, "If you want to touch the sky / Better learn how to kneel. / On your knees, boy!"