You know, I don't consider myself a fatalist, nor a fan of Murphy and his Law. I do fancy O. Henry and harbor a certain ironic view of life. I've been accused of being a sarcastic bitch who makes fun of everything. Yeah, okay, I am, but I make fun of myself first and foremost. It manages to keep me amused for endless hours. I also observe some rules of life I've stumbled upon, have had fly at me out of a cabinet or have dropped on my head from a passing aircraft. They are as follows:
1. Never pass up an opportunity to empty your bladder, especially before setting out on a trip of indeterminate length, into unknown territory. There are way too many ugly horrible gas station bathrooms out there, or worse.
2. Hanging up on a telemarketer doesn't get rid of said person. He/she and his colleagues will be back ringing your line in a few days. The worst offender? AT&T.
3. Finally doing those much-anticipated home improvements will alert the moving gods; you'll be outta there within six months. I finally found the perfect color to paint the guest room, not once but twice, we moved. I put the laminate floors I loved in, voila, we moved.
4. Never say anything in front of a small child you wouldn't pay to put in the local newspaper. A newspaper that whomever you are saying the thing about reads first in the morning. It can be that fast, accurate and percussive.
5. The label on a permanent Sharpie says: Do Not Shake. They're serious about this, no exceptions.
6. They're serious about permanent too, especially on a silk suit you've mortgaged the house to afford. Jacket AND skirt.
7. All the good immunity stuff from breastfeeding only goes one way. If you ruin your figure permanently and give your child the indelible shield against whatever illnesses you've had, don't think for a moment that fifteen minutes after he's home feeling poorly from the plague he picked up from the neighborhood that you're not in for it, only worse than he's got. Oh and your husband, worst of all (so he says) so you don't really get to be sick at all.
8. One of those little tiny eyebrow trimmer thingies may resist your efforts to halt all tweezing by leaving an occasional stray brow hair, but by the same token these suckers can take out giant clumps of eyelashes in a blink. One blink, no waiting.
9. Go ahead, wear the suede shoes. It will rain. This is the adjunct to the light a cigarette and the waiter will come, go to the ladies' room, the doctor will call your name, and finally give up trying, you'll get pregnant rule.
10. The thing about wearing clean underwear in case of an accident is really true. In my case, I'd gone commando (I was young, rebellious and in a severe hurry) and wound up in a car wreck. As the intern in the ER was cutting my jeans off me to have a look at my boo-boo leg, I squirmed and mentioned I didn't happen to have panties on. He laughed and said, "no big deal, I've seen those before." I said, "But you haven't seen MINE." I was mortified and bottomless. My mother had her revenge right there, I think.
There you go, rules of life to know and share, or what the hell, ignore them until they bite you on the butt like I did. I'm juuuust fine, if you don't notice the clump of missing eyelashes.
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