If you came here expecting to read another edition of the Harry and Martha chronicles you are going to be sorely disappointed because a late arriving email derailed the train.
So let’s set the scene by rolling out a cover of a song that reminds us that sometimes a familiar song can be sung by another.
Is She Really Crazy
The lack of punctuation is intentional because it allows for multiple interpretations and sometimes we need that kind of reminder that we don’t always know what we think we know.
At least, that is what I keep reminding myself because I interpreted certain things as being a certain way.
I looked at what was shared as being bad behavior and my initial response was not favorable. It was irritation verging on the edge or anger.
Took a couple of deep breaths, closed my eyes and concluded that I still believe I was force fed a trough full of bullshit and shook my head.
Shook it because I am not sure if they believe what they shovel or said it because they felt some sort of obligation.
An elephant wouldn’t care about it and not because of the strength of their conviction.
****
My daughter comes to me to ask for my opinion about some 8th grade shenanigans and our conversation goes all over the place.
I am surprised when I tell her about how I stopped speaking to an ex-girlfriend that worked at the same place I did.
“Dad, are you exaggerating things?
I smile and say I am not certain and tell her if my memory is accurate I didn’t talk to her for about a year and then mention a few other people I stopped speaking to.
“It was a long time ago, I was in my twenties. I don’t know if it was the right or mature thing and I might handle things differently if they happened now.”
She nods her head and when she walks upstairs I watch her go and remember a time when the only way she would have gone up those would have been if I had carried her.
That is a long time ago and much is different.
She is listening intently to what I say and filing it away while I do my best to give her advice that will serve her well.
She Writes Like Her Father
I hear her singing while she works on her homework and wonder if the sudden silence occurs because she is concentrating on Algebra or if there is another reason.
It is probably not because she is writing because the words flow from her fingertips with a familiar ease.
She writes like her father does and will probably be better at it, assuming she focuses her will and intention upon it.
It is hard to say, there is so much going on inside that head and I don’t follow all of it.
I try, but I am not a 13 year-old girl or even an almost middle aged woman and some of it feels like gibberish to me.
When she speaks I do my best to pay attention and follow along. Much of it is easy but there are things that make my head spin because I haven’t a clue as to the logic or rationale.
Her mother, aunts and grandmothers follow along but me, well sometimes I do and sometimes I just don’t.
Can’t say how much of it is because some topics are just not of interest and some topics are things that I won’t understand.
Someone once told me that was a bad thing to say and I shook my head and asked them if they had ever deal with spray back when standing at a urinal.
They said “ew” and I said “yeah.”
There is no value judgment in this, one is not better than the other, they are just different.
It is like when I listen to mothers talk about being pregnant, some things are easily recognizable to me but I can’t appreciate it the same way a woman who has been pregnant can.
Unreasonable
The words in the email struck me as unbalanced and unreasonable.
A few hours before I had come across a post from 2009 about the intifada arriving on campus and had taken a nasty dive into a topic I have covered and encountered too often, antisemitism masquerading as antizionism.
Though there was no relationship between the email and the post that sense of unbalanced and unreasonable connected them.
If the intent was to provoke me it worked but I chose not to respond because sometimes silence is the most powerful response you can use.
Sometimes the strongest attack is to ignore the other and pretend they don’t exist, assuming that is why you do it.
Because when the silence extends between people you never know for certain whether there is intent or if it is just coincidence.
It is like using laying our four words but not including the punctuation for them. You don’t know whether they are meant with a period, question mark or exclamation point.
But the email, well there was no concern about what the intent was so I stayed silent and will remain so.
Let the other party wonder.
If they care they’ll reach out and if they don’t well that is ok too.
The joy of people is never understated, now is it.
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