Advice

Someone that I know via Twitter, of whom I am rather fond, recently asked for people to give their one piece of advice, their "rule for life" if you will, to assist her in a project.

I thought quite hard about it. I started to worry that I don't have any at all.  When I'd finished breathing into a paper bag, I came to the more realistic conclusion that I don't have just one.

So here, in no particular order, are my set of life ethics. Vaguely. These are, of course, subject to change as I decide to break them or remember something else that was much, much better. Dammit.

Rules aren't there to be broken, but sometimes they need to be shaped to fit.
This was one of the biggies for me. I follow rules. Always. I'm the Richie Cunningham of rule breaking (apart from not being ginger. Or American. Or fictional); I just don't.  The arrival of children, specifically autistic children means that I will bend rules if need be, mostly because I know to pick my battles. 

Pick your battles.
If only the ConDems could follow this piece of advice, but on a literal rather than a metaphorical level. Perhaps if they had had a Nan like mine, a woman who was hard enough to roll her own tampons, they would do. They'd certainly know not to fuck with a disabled lady in her 70s, or any disabled person for that matter. It's something Norman Tebbit learned after just one encounter with her.  Again, this has had more resonance since I had children. You know what? If you chose not to eat your tea, that's up to you. Just don't come bitching at me half an hour after you weren't hungry demanding cake only to start bitching when I point you in the direction of your crusty arsed tea because you know I will let you scream your small person head off.

Manners apply to everyone.
This is an unbendable rule. I'm looking at you, elderly lady who thinks that she can push to the front of the queue when my kids have been waiting patiently and correctly for the bus for twenty minutes.  Yes, I will point it out to you. Not only that, I will march you to the back of the line if need be.  You'll be the first to complain when they end up mugging you in 10 years time for your pension because I didn't teach them manners, and you know it.

There's no such thing as failing.
You don't fail. You just perfect on the journey.

You get there when you get there.
See above. Sometimes fear keeps you back. Sometimes circumstance procrastinates for you. Sometimes other people steam ahead in their lovely, shiny lives seemingly oblivious whilst you sit there gnawing at your knuckles unable to fathom how you fucked up. Fact is; you didn't. You didn't fuck up. You learned. You grew. You took that knowledge on to perfection. To re-iterate above; there's no such thing as failing, because you get there when you get there.

There's gold all around; you just have to remember to see it.
You look at it and see a pile of shit. I look at it and see something I can use in my garden to grow my vegetables. You see a dollop of rubbish in the shit. I look at the shit and see gold, even though it's only a Caramac wrapper. A while ago, a person I love recorded me the Dr Who theme on a stylophone that I sent him. It made me smile so widely that it kept me going for a good few days afterwards.  Through all the shit, though all the trauma, there's a Caramac wrapper or the Dr Who theme being played on a stylophone, and it's all for you.

Not being the special one is hard.
Maybe you don't have super powers. Maybe you aren't a whiz at calculus. Possibly you can't sight read music. You know, you may not even have the great novel unwritten inside of you.  Doesn't matter because you know what?

I'm going to love you anyway, and there's absolutely nothing you can do about it.
To me, you're special. To me, you're perfect. You can reel off a million reasons why you think you're not and I'll rebut everyone. Twice. The fact is, I love you, and there's absolutely nothing you can do about it. Ha!