This past fall when I was going on job interviews, I was asked the routine question: ""What are your three greatest strengths?"" Talking about one's strengths always feels a bit conceited, but I guess if they're asking you really don't have a choice but to answer. One of the strengths I'd list was being a thoughtful listener. Well, long story short, that virtue was put to the test this spring break. Here are some examples of when listening can be tough…
Listening to adult stuff that I don't give two hoots about
I swear to God, if I heard my mom say the words ""pillow top mattress"" one more time, I was going to freak the flip out. My parents are renovating their bedroom. Updating our house is nice except for one thing—I have to hear about every miniscule decision that's made. I've seen so many fabrics in the past few days I think pink paisley might actually explode out of my ears. I was a good daughter by patiently listening to my mom talk about mattresses for an hour. Once she finally picked one out, it was like little angels started singing ""hallelujah"" softly in my ear.
Well shut the front door and tell the cherub choir to quiet down because mattress talk was not over. On St. Patrick's Day I woke up to my mom saying, ""Kathleen, my back is killing me. I don't know about the pillow top mattress. It's too soft. Come test it out."" I rolled over to look at the clock: 7 a.m.
In my head I calmly said, ""Mother, it's St. Patrick's Day. I know you don't want to hear this, but I fully intend on drinking a lot of beer and staying out late to celebrate my heritage. Although I'd rather we never talk about mattresses again, at the very least, we need to wait until tomorrow."" That's what I wanted to say, but I knew if I had any chance of her making me pancakes and bacon, I had to zip my mouth shut. So instead I sluggishly got out of bed, dragged my feet to her room and tried out her mattress. It felt perfectly fine.
Awesome, I could go back to sleep, right? Nope. You see, my opinion wasn't quite good enough. If your mom is anything like mine, then you know your input isn't valuable until it affirms her own opinion. After defending my stance for a minute, I caved. ""You know, you might be right. It's a little too soft,"" I said. Voila! She smiled with satisfaction and I was allowed to go back to sleep. Two hours later I ate my pancakes, all while listening to the different paint color options for a closet that no one other than she and my dad are ever going to see. Good times!
Too many names and so little incentive to care
Isn't it the worst when a friend gets all excited to tell you a story you know you are going to have zero interest in? Let me show you what I mean:
Friend: Kathleen! You won't believe what happened…
Me: Hold up, are you about to tell me a longwinded and elaborate pointless story about a bunch of people I don't know and will never meet?
Friend: Uhh yeah I guess.
Me: OK can you do me a favor and either start talking to that wall over there or take a hike? Because I'm going to be honest, I can already tell I'm going to zone out in about 12 seconds. If that.
Catching up with someone you marginally knew in high school
Where to even begin? Grocery stores, the post office and the movie theatre are all hubs for running into people from high school you'd really be fine without seeing for the rest of your life. If we barely talked when we sat next to each other in chemistry for a whole year, I'm going to take a wild guess we probably won't have much to talk about now.
Well, needless to say, probably like many of you, I had one of those run-ins over break. Mine was on St. Patty's Day at a local bar. It's my own fault. I don't even know why I went in the first place; I knew it was going to be crowded and I was guaranteed to talk to someone I wouldn't want to.
BAM! Within 20 seconds of walking into the bar I'm talking to a girl named Elizabeth whom I haven't seen since we conjugated Spanish verbs our freshman year of high school. I asked what I thought was an innocent question, ""How are you?"" and I ended up getting her life story. Apparently she's majoring in nursing, looking to move to Milwaukee and has been on and off with a boy from Michigan. Around the time she started talking about getting her wisdom teeth pulled is when I blocked out her voice and tried to see if I could mentally name all 44 presidents in order.
Listening to someone talk about politics
I'm sorry. In between all of the pretentious jargon you spat at me, I kind of got lost. I heard something about respecting the American flag and possibly something about eating brats on the Fourth of July. Can you start over and slooooow down or just promise to never talk to me about politics again? I'd prefer the latter.
Don't worry; I got full permission from my mom to poke fun at her. As far as Elizabeth? Well, if all goes as planned, I won't see her again for another eight years. Have any virtues of yours tested this spring break? Please share with Kathleen at kqbrosnan@wisc.edu.
