Practice Listening

Hi Sheryl. I was at the gym this morning and Sheryl and I seemed to get into a heated discussion about diets. When I left she seemed perturbed and I was confused. The thing is, we were agreeing with each other, but neither one of us could let the other one have the last word. I even brought the theory of evolution into it--what's that all about? (That's a Sheryl line that I love--"What's that all about?") I think it really started when I told her that I'm not spiritual. When you say that you are not spiritual to someone who is very spiritual, it's hard for them not to take it personally. If you broaden the definition of spiritual (a lot), then I am and since I'm an attorney and I know how to do that, I should have just said yes. Of course, then we would have been having a heated discussion about God instead of diets, so maybe it's all for the best.

So I get home and I drive Adam to school. I asked him how school was, fine. How's everything, fine. Does he need anything, no. Did he finish his homework, yes. At toastmasters, we have this exercise to practice listening. I told Adam I wanted to practice listening and he wasn't helping. Not even a smile. What we need is a common enemy--that's a great thing to bring people closer together. So whoever you are out there, I apologize, but Adam and I are going to rake you over the coals.

I just looked at the title of this blog and said, are you listening to yourself? What's that all about?

It's raining. No I haven't just gone to the car wash to make it rain, but the window washers are cleaning the windows on our building--go figure.

I started my class a few days ago. There's only about nine kids so far and it was pretty easy except that one kid kept falling asleep and only one other kid was answering obvious questions. And there's a kid who kept talking during class to the girl behind him. I really have to nip that in the bud. Last year it got really distracting. I told them they all get A's if they just participate, but that didn't seem to impress them. This crowd doesn't have all pre-law types, so I'm not sure how debates will go over, but we'll see. Third times the charm, so I'm looking forward to an easy term.

My next speech for toastmasters should be a touching story. I don't know any touching stories. What I need to do is broaden my definition of touching story and really think outside the box here. Inspirational is touching. Tragic is touching. Overcoming great odds. No, these are all in the box. The clues are all out there in the universe--I just need to listen. I'm going to have to work on this one for a while. Well for two weeks anyway, because that's when I have to give the speech. [Hey, how about two people who won't let the other have the last word even when they agree with each other because one knows that the other needs to hear something and she should just tell her what she wants to hear, but noooooo, she has to define a thing narrowly, because she knows that the other one probably defines that thing rather narrowly, so she won't. Huh? Spirituality--now that's got touching story possibilities.]

This blogging is somewhere between a bad convoluted essay and a one sided telephone conversation with your best friend. Take it with a grain of salt or chocolate. Chocolate's good with everything. Chocolate cake is good, even when you drop it on the floor. Hey, is "I didn't know there were eggs in the cake" a touching story? That would be way easier than spirituality.