A Little Honesty?

You may prefer this one as it's a bit more "downhome", or, on the other hand you may not like it because it hits a bit too close to home. Either way, best ask yourself why.

Right. So I waffled on about making assumptions about people, and about getting offended.

You know what pisses me right off? People who, when taking offence, come back with "You don't know me." It often goes along with a whiny tone, and can be followed by some long list of tragic things in their life that have caused them to take offence easily.

I have met far too many people whose lives really are a story of a series of unfortunate events, with no hope of it improving either, and yet are cheerful and positive and kind and funny, for this "poor me" and "I'm misunderstood" rubbish to have any effect on me whatsoever.

If somebody starts with the "You don't know what it's like to be me..." or similar I am turned off. I can be very sympathetic to people in all sorts of sutuations, even if their bad luck is their own damn fault, but I can't be done with the "nobody understands me" thing. So there's that.

We all get misunderstood, this is normal. No, nobody understands you. They are not you. This applies to absolutely everyone. What's more, no matter how hard we try, we will never really understand one another, because we can't get inside each other's heads. So live with it.

What we can do is care. That's all that really matters. You don't have to understand to care.

I'm sure you've heard "I don't understand his lifestyle." Well, it's not your lifestyle so it's none of your business anyway.

Anyway, I confess to being mischievous. I'm not even asahmed of it, how about that, tsk. People often misunderstand me and I love it. I suppose it's a bit perverse, but there it is. I love it when I meet people and they totally get me wrong.

I turn 53 soon (gawd, how did that happen) and depending on which way the wind is blowing and other variables, sometimes I come across as a regular 53-year-old woman, (whatever that is) and sometimes I don't. Sometimes I comes across as gentle and harmless, and sometimes I come across as feisty and edgy. Sometimes people think I'm very dull, and sometimes they think I'm dangerous. Sometimes they think I'm wise and sometimes they think I'm an idiot. And none of them are wrong.

It's not that I'm complex, far from it. That's another one I can't stand "I'm very complex". Oh, get you, trying to make yourself sound fascinating. I am incredibly, boringly, not complex, and that's a fact. I've been called inscrutable, which is bollocks. People are just looking for something more, something deeper, that isn't there. This is it. This is all there is.

And nobody understands me. You won't hear any "BOOHOO" added to that because it's funny being misunderstood.

There's a running joke around here, which I use while batting my eyelids and feigning innocence, that I'm a sweet little old knitting granny. And it's the truth, so it is.

The problem is stereotypes, that's what fucks the whole thing up. So I play with them.

There are women my age who desperately try to pretend they are younger, or even try to look younger, and they usually end up quite miserable in the attempt. I think it's sad. There are also women my age who have decided that they are OLD, so they do nothing, learn nothing, seek nothing, and ultimately have nothing. They are waiting for the reaper.

It really isn't necessary to dress like a teenager and go dancing in clubs to prove you're not aging. Nor is it wrong to do if you want to. There are no rules.

Everyone seems to think it's all about appearance, and it's not. It's all in the mind. And you know, it takes longer to figure that out, so there's some major laziness involved here (another pet peeve of mine is people who are proud of being lazy).

So people make the excuse that they have to create an image, I suppose it's to warn people.

"I dress like this to feel confident."

My dear, if you need special clothes to do that, then it's fake. When you can feel confident stark naked, then we'll call you confident.

"I like to give a professional impression."

You'll do that when you speak. No, really.

It's tribal, all of this. If I were an alien I'd assume men in suits and ties all belonged to a cult. Yes, I know they can look very nice, that's not the point. It's still really weird.

I think my favourite tribe are hipsters. No, I'm not going to be unkind. They are people too and if they want to be that pretentious they can be. I just think somebody should tell them they're not fooling anyone. They spend so much time trying to be different they end up all being the same. If you can recognize a hipster at a glance......well, there's your clue. Oh, and by the way, it's not attractive. (I assume it's not meant to be?)

Be yourself, and if that is really, honestly awful, then change.