If You Belonged Here

Kiss My Grits

You know, I'm going to have to double check that I haven't used that title before, because I've got a couple hundred posts and that's the kind of jerky cliche I'm into, so you never know.

I'll get back to you on that.

Anyway, I've got a bad case of screw-you-and-the-horse-you-rode-in-on. I like to attribute this to being the mother of a three-year-old. I kind of use up all of my patience, understanding, and humoring abilities on a person whose egocentrism, selfishness, and constant neediness is totally age appropriate so I don't have a lot left over for  people who are old enough to know better. 

Only lately it's getting out of control. Lately, I feel that it's not only my capacity to coddle that's diminished but my basic civility. Now, The Dol will tell you, but only with my permission and only in the nicest way possible, that my own brain-to-mouth filter is probably not factory standard. I'm used to introducing myself to my own thoughts as they appear in that little bubble outside of my mouth that lets me know that, indeed, I just said that outloud.

Especially if wine is involved.

Thing is that I'm used to that. I'm not condoning it or saying there's no room for improvement--and if you ask The Dol, she can verify that, too--but I am saying that I've come to accept it as my baseline. Much like black tee-shirts and jeans are also my baseline.

It's what I do.

What I don't do is say it out loud in a way intended to offend. I just say what I say without an ounce of meanness and if it happens to hurt someone's feelings, well, it was never my intention. I haven't been an intentional feeling hurter since my divorce.

Right.

So it's been really fortunate that most of my relationships don't take place in real life because I've got the opportunity to delete my unfiltered comments before they go out in the world. In the past twenty-four hours alone I've backspaced over all kinds of words that I don't normally have occasion to type, including a few that I might have invented.

This is the thing. I know I belong here. I've got an idea that several others of you belong here. But, seriously, me, I'm here. (That was a little hometown Québécois flare thrown in for you.) Let's do it again:

I belong here, me.

You? Maybe yes, maybe no. Maybe not so much. That's your deal. I'll respect whatever answer you come up with. But me, this is my little world where I get to suspend disbelief and pretend that everyone shares my sense of humor, that everyone is intelligent and capable of higher level thought, and that everyone knows that this parade is about me, me, me.

And instead I'm wasting my time running spellcheck for people who not only don't get the joke but can't take the time to put together a coherent sentence about why it's not funny. So basically, I'm having to argue with myself about why I'm insensitive and ignorant and just don't get it. This is making me bored.

Except it's not.

I'm having a great time. I just wanted to complain because sometimes that's fun for me. But you know what else is starting to feel like it might be fun for me? Letting people's comments run without cleaning up their typos. And then calling them stupid-donut-heads.

Just for good measure,  I turned off the comments on the dog post.

P.S. I wrote this post over a week ago. I don't remember what it says. But it was time for a new post to go up. In other words, I'm not taking this at all seriously. Seriously.

Not Yo Mama

Lately I've been having to beat them off with a stick. I can't get rid of them. They won't go away. And, seriously, people, I'm just not that into other people's kids.

Oh, I've got room in my heart for my own. Most days. And room in my heart for the offspring of those I know and love, especially if they look like me. But the wee children of strangers hold absolutely no thrall for me. I'm about as excited about having them crawling on me as I would be about, say, being flocked by pigeons.

All I can think about is the germs.

I take Secret Lulu places and while other parents are hiding out in a corner somewhere while their children swing from the chandeliers--these are nice places--I'm at Secret Lulu's side taking advantage of "language opportunities." So I play with my kid and I talk to my kid and I generally do my best to forget that I'd rather poke my eye out.

Only other people's kids think I'm one of those grown ups, you know, the kind who have fun at the park. I am not one of those grown ups, people. I am only interested in the slide as a catalyst for motor planning and the opportunity it affords for illustrating the conversational use of the words "up" and "down."

Stranger kids don't know that. Stranger kids come to me with their boo-boos, want to be pushed on the swing, and demand that I impose their views of fairness on yet more stranger kids. They're so hopeful and eager. They're so not my kid.

If only that meant they were so not my problem. 

But it's hard to be mean to little kids. If only because I'm afraid their parents might come out of hiding, take umbrage, and attack. And also, because they don't know any better. I'd rather not be so involved that I take on the responsibility of teaching them.

So I endure. I really do mean endure. These tiny people have razor sharp elbows and pointy little feet and if I happen to be sitting still for longer than it takes to say "hello" I often find them scaling me like the rock wall at REI. I gingerly pluck them off and deposit them to safety, gently decline their offers of used gum, and deflect their sincere, though often boogery, attempts at friendship.

The worst part is that I am acutely aware that their parents are nowhere to be found. Seriously. More than once I've found myself lingering somewhere I'd rather not be because a child who's barely old enough to identify their own nose is seemingly on their own in a public park, library, or book store. If my intentions were less than honorable--okay, so my intentions aren't honorable so much as disaffected--I could walk off with one of these little ankle biters.

Not only would there not be a struggle but the kid would probably be the one to suggest it. 

So where are these parents and why don't they care? Secret Lulu is a pretty stand-offish kid so I'm not exactly having to preach stranger-danger to her, but why do these kids seem so attention starved. Is it because they really aren't getting their fair share of attention or is it because for some kids there is no such thing as enough attention.

I don't know, people. I really don't. And I wouldn't care so much if Secret Lulu wanted to play with them, but she doesn't. After all, she's already got the coolest playmate at the park.

That would be me.

How to Choose Your Battles

So the question on my mind this week is this: how do I know "when to hold 'em, when to fold 'em, when to walk away, and when to run?" 

Well, first I decide if the issue is important to me. Then I look at all the sides and choose mine, often having to fabricate an as-of-yet non-existent position to take into account all of the subtle nuances of my opinion. Then I decide what I can do about that position, if anything, and adjust my actions accordingly. If I can persuade someone else to go along with my crackpot ideas, I'm always happy, as long as the conversion was hard won and I feel we have truly met an understanding of minds.

I don't bother wasting energy arguing with people who can't influence the outcome of the situation or who, if they are persuaded, aren't really responding to my spooky brand of logic at all but some greater need to have harmony in our relationship.

I don't need that kind of harmony, people. 

But I avoid talking to crazy people. You know, the kind who might set my dog afire, or gauge out my eyes, or yell, or something like that. So that's a place to start.

Mostly, I'd rather not battle at all. Not in the interest of ever-loving harmony but because I'm more about the free exchange of ideas and trying to understand the other person than I am about trying to convert them. I am also about them trying to understand me. And mutual respect, which of course needs to be earned, or at least established. 

I am also about making sure that I've arrived at the right battle. No sense getting my knickers in a twist about something that is taken out of context or misquoted or just plain not my conversation. Like, I wouldn't walk over to two people dishing about candidates in Starbucks and tell them that they are wrong because they just happen to be talking about something I have a different opinion on.

Sure, they're having that conversation in a public place and they've allowed me to overhear it, and sure I have a well-thought out position on that topic and a matching bumper sticker for my car, but it's not my business. Now if, say, my mom calls me with the same opinion, I might try to get past my initial shock and horror to see her reasoning, and maybe attempt to dismantle it with my own, but not if she gets emotional because, as I already typed, I don't do that. Someone else might, but I don't.

Because at the end of the day, I'm okay with agreeing to disagree. I prefer the person disagreeing with me to be in possession of an argument that is at least rational unto itself, but I wasn't born into this world waving a magic wand--clearly an oversight--and so I get what I get. I don't cry about it at night.

So let's see. How can I illustrate this point without bringing in specifics that will distract people from the generalization that I'm trying to make here? Okay, I'll make up a ballot proposition. Let's call it Prop Kiss Me, I'm Irish. 

Now I'm all for Kissing the Irish and I've even done it myself once or twice but I don't want to have to kiss every person of Irish heritage that I meet. I mean, they aren't all Matt M., so there you go. Wait. Is he Irish? Well, let's say he is for the sake of this battle. Anyway, I don't want to have to kiss the Irish so I'm voting against it. Call me closed-minded, I just can't make that promise. And I'd be more worried about this but the town I live in doesn't have any Irish.

(anyone who might be thinking of correcting me on that, take a moment to realize how ridiculous you'll sound to those of us who get suspension of disbelief and the limitations of arbitrary examples)

Anyway, I've got an opinion and I've got a slight interest in having my opinion agreed with, after all, I don't want Prop KMI to pass, because it might, I'm not sure how, ruin an otherwise fine day maybe someday in the future. Again.

Now, my opinion isn't carved in stone, and maybe it's based on ignorance, and maybe it's self-centered, and maybe it's just plain evil. I don't know. I haven't thought about it that much. So you have an opportunity to sway me, say if you're pro Prop KMI. You could call me names but, let's face it, calling someone a doodie-head isn't likely to put them in a receptive mood. Or you could listen to me, try to figure out what it is I object to because maybe there's already a built in clause that says something like "only if you feel like it" and then I won't be so personally worried.

Or you could realize that there is no Proposition Kiss Me I'm Irish and not work yourself up into a froth over something that doesn't exist, can't have any effect, and isn't really about Kissing or Irish or anything at all.

So that's what I try to do, first I figure out if there's something to fight about, then I figure out if it's my personal fight or a fight that has meta-level implications for people as a whole (and since I'm people, I like to know these things), then I decide what capacity I can battle in, then I go for it. Or I stay home. Because, hey, I might have a headache.

What I don't do is get hip-deep in a battle for nothing with no one in particular for no good reason at all. That's just wasting time.

And seriously, I'd rather get my nails done.

Oh, and one more thing: I try to remember that the battle is not the war. There are implications there people, but I'll let you sermonize for yourselves.