Hmmm. Let's see. I was raised to be modest. Keep my opinions to myself. Speak when spoken to. Don't contridict your elders in front of others, it is disrespectful. So here is blogging, after years of telling myself, don't say that, if someone wanted your opinion then they would ask for it, then there is this new openess in the world. Tell everyone that you are at the dentist and he is rinsing out your mouth RIGHT THIS MINUTE. Don't forget to Twitter when you spit. What happens to your words? What happens to your voice when you hold back, because you were told that you should? Does it go away? Does it ever come back if it does? When I talk to people who KNEW ME WHEN they tend to say things like 'when you said that to me it really hit a note' or ' when you did that I thought that was so interesting and so just you' or 'you helped me make a difference in my own life' then I think that what I said at those particular moments must have been something that was worth hearing.
I know that there have been a few moments that I heard something that someone was trying to tell me, and I really listened. Like the time I was helping this older lady home with her groceries, I was probably around 14, she was talking and I was listening and she said to me, 'I never wore makeup like the girls do today, it's not a bad thing personally, but to your skin it will become really bad when you wear makeup everyday. How old do I look?' I said, 'maybe 67' she said 'I am 79 years old' she really had good skin, but for the few wrinkles she really DID look great. So I listened. I have great skin even without makup. I did not wear makeup except for special occasions, interviews and then very light. Enough to accent not cover up. I have friends that now after years of wearing makeup look dead without it.
Then there is the ex-boyfriend who used to beat his other girlfriend, who when he had a few too many, I was 18 ok, told me that if a guy ever hit me ONCE then leave him ASAP. ‘A man who hits a woman once will never change after crossing that line.’ After that I would become the nosey neighbor who would show up at my neighbors door to say ENOUGH, she is coming over my house now until she feels safe or until you are gone for good, whatever she needs. I learned that not all women were told to drop that guy after once. He never hit me.
There are some many things that I chose to HEAR. My son's grandfather who told me when he was drunk, 'never listen to ANYTHING that a drunk tells you.' So if someone I was with was a bit tipsy even and said, 'I love You' or 'I hate you' then I just ignored it, never even brought up that ANYTHING was said, because they were drunk. I later applied this to many incapacitations, such as exaustion, illness, distraction, high on drugs, or even to just plain obliviousness. This has worked well for me not to take things personally and to keep friends who many people would have lost touch with because of different personality flaws.
I love my friends even when they are drunk. So maybe blogging can make a small spot of someone's day a little better. Maybe someone will say something to me that makes me smile when I most need it, or helps me to hang on through the tough times. So I urge my friends to pour your heart out. And I urge readers to assume everything you read has been written by a drunk ;-)
0 comments:
Post a Comment