Some days I just beam with pride at my ability to live on my own as an independent, successful adult. I pay my bills, change my light bulbs, and keep the place extremely tidy! I can cook, bake, tastefully decorate and do laundry too!
Other days I cringe at my mistakes, wonder how I made it through adolescence without learning a tad more basic knowledge and generally hope that one day I will stop making careless choices in an effort to “save time.” Haste makes waste (or broken glass!), right?
Some recent examples:
• I am an experienced, educated adult…except when the pilot light on my gas stove goes out and I have no earthly clue how to fix it. What do I know? I grew up with an electric stove! So I googled it and asked anyone who I deemed knowledgeable, but not overly judgmental. Several people told me to light it with a match and I begged each of them to come over and do it for me. You know—just in case flames burst from the stove. After no one jumped on this offer and several days of cooking with only two burners, I got out a match, held my breath and re-lit the pilot light. Turns out— it’s not so hard!
• I am an immaculately clean adult…except when my toilet overflows due to months of regularly flushing paper towels. Who knew you couldn’t flush paper towels down the toilet? I mean, I knew you couldn’t put a whole lot of anything into the bowl and expect it to flush in one fell swoop, but I always thought that if you made it past the flushing stage without any problems you were home free. So after scrubbing my sink, shower and toilet with paper towels, I would flush them one or two at a time. My bathroom trashcan is too small for such a purpose and I feel averse to carrying dirty, chemical-covered wads into the kitchen. Needless to say, after having my landlord and a plumber work quite hard to unclog my very clogged pipes, I have learned to dispose of my cleaning towels elsewhere!
• I am an adult with fairly decent cooking skills….except when I spill near-boiling vegetable oil on my carpet after trying to carry it across the room. I grew up watching my dad make my favorite meal of homemade chicken nuggets. The first time I tried to do this myself I neglected to monitor the temperature of the oil and ended up overheating it. Oddly, I decided the best and quickest way to decrease the temperature (besides the obvious solution of turning off the heat and allowing it to cool) would be to pick up the heavy pan, carry it to my open back door and allow the cold winter air to blow over the pan. Unsurprisingly, the oil sloshed over the edge and made a bunch of little black burns in my carpet. Thank goodness for doormats!
• I am a very efficient, cautious adult with good luck…except when karma comes after me and I miraculously avoid cracking a window and shattering a wine bottle, only to break a wine glass. One evening I decided that I couldn’t possibly take two trips out back to the garbage and recycling bins and had to carry everything in one trip. (Unfortunately, this is the decision I come to almost every time I have to empty the rubbish.) I put some cardboard boxes under my arm, grabbed two bags of trash in my left hand and tried to juggle an overflowing brown bag of recycling in the other arm. A wine bottle went rolling right out of the recycling bag and smashed into the glass door. Neither broke! I patted myself on the back for having good fortune and lugged everything out…still in one trip. When I came back in to do the dishes, I promptly dropped a Lenox wine glass on the counter and spent the next 20 minutes scooping up shards of glass. C'est la Vie!
This is a great post - I can identify to almost all of these !!!
ReplyDeleteI often marvel at the fact that I'm widely thought of as an adult. Me. Seriously? I've got these three kids that look at me like I know things, I am the grown up after all. It's sort of funny to me. Because other than te physical stuff. I don't feel much older than they are!
ReplyDeleteGreat post! I share your anxiety about lighting pilot lights. I imagine months in a burn unit!