Go Ahead With Your Own Life...Leave Me Alone!

I was a special eight year old. The Billy Joel song referenced above was literally my theme song. I hated being told what to do, when to do it, with whom I should do it, or how to do it. My emotions ran high pretty much all the time. It was during this phase of my life that I began self-imposed anger management seminars. I was so easily overwhelmed by emotion, and I so disliked being unable to control how I felt that after the third Saturday in a row of me crying my eyes out and embers of rage burning within me over something chore-related, I just couldn't take it anymore and decided there had to be a better way to live. It took awhile, and sometimes I still have meltdowns, but I think it's safe to say that things are better (overall) for me emotionally these days.

It's interesting that as an eight-year-old I related more to that song than I do now. Now the line that resonates with me is "Either way, it's okay, you wake up with yourself." The key is to being happy with the self you're waking up with. Doing the things you tell yourself you're going to do is so important. Being emotionally honest with yourself and with others is often the most difficult thing you can do in life, but if you can, you're so much better off. Hardly anybody wants to hear it (and here's where another Billy Joel song pops in my head, "Honesty...it's such a lonely word...everyone is so untrue. Honesty, it's hardly ever heard! But it's mostly what I need from you").

The more your actions align with your thoughts and your emotional plans to be honest, the happier you will be. In the last few months, I let go of some things that had been bothering me for a long time. I kept telling myself I was going to do it, that I needed to do it, but the fear of an emotional blowout kept me from it. In the end, it wasn't nearly as hard as I thought it was going to be. I had already distanced myself from the situation, and it was just in my mind that the things I was laying to rest had power over me.


I walked to the river of dreams and let the things holding me back from rising like a phoenix, triumphant, fiery, and brave slip into the depths. I told the little devils inside me to go ahead with their own lives and leave me alone. It was liberating. It was needed. It was wrenching.

I don't know if the imps are completely exorcised, but they are vacationing somewhere very warm -- too warm for me -- and I don't wish them to come back. If they ever do, here's hoping beyond hope that I'll sing with all the emotion of that angsty eight year old: "Go ahead with your own life. Leave me alone."

Hair, Hoar::Etymology, Entomology

The other day I went to a meeting with my boss. Although it has mostly been a really mild winter, there were a few really cold days last week, and this was one of them. We went outside to get in the truck, and lo and behold, there was hoar frost on it. It had sprouted up on the edges of the pickup and in the bed like hair grows on a head. It reminded me of someone I knew in junior high who used to "frost" his hair. (He once frosted his eyebrows, too -- made them bleached, when he had black hair. It looked kind of interesting for awhile, especially since he stopped about halfway through and decided he didn't want to go through with it.)

It looked like little frost grass had grown up, as almost all hoar frost does. I was struck by the uniformity of it -- the little crystalline warriors marching up and down the truck rail. I wonder why they call it hoar frost instead of hair frost. Maybe it all started as a misunderstanding...someone said, "This looks like hair!" and his or her friend thought something else had been said. Probably someone with a more serious interest in linguistics could tell me. Etymology, not entomology, right? Just like hair, hoar. (And I know some of you reading this wanted to add, "Har," as in hardy hard har NOT FUNNY, after that last sentence.)

hard time etiquette

When I say, "hard time," I'm not referring to jail sentences.

I'm referring to times like when your boyfriend breaks up with you, you're having family drama, your job is shaky, one of your best friends tells you you're too needy, or you've just gotten bad news in the health department.

Some people hold all the hard time in.

I can't do that.

Not at all.

Sometimes, I really, really wish I could.

So what's a person to do when it feels like one or more life cornerstones have vanished and toppling into the abyss is looking like a very real possibility?

Here are a few things I have learned during my Hard Times, which I hope may help you if you are ever in one of these situations.

Rule number one in this day and age, if your heartache is related to any relationship, is No negative social media. None. Don't post cryptic comments condemning the perceived narcissist in your life. (It could be that the actual narcissist is YOU.) Don't post "poor me" comments and expect someone to take pity on you and ask you what the matter is. Just don't do it. It's in poor taste and I really can't recommend it. Don't even write blog posts about it! The fact is, while people love you and care about you, playing it that way really just makes you look like you're about thirteen years old emotionally. Maybe that's why sometimes I still mess up and do this -- because sometimes I feel about thirteen emotional years old.

Rule number two is related: try to fix the problems between you and the other person in your relationships with that person. Sometimes you legitimately need to talk to another person about what is happening, but chances are, if you communicate with the person directly, it will actually be easier on everybody. Being emotionally honest is hard; in the end, it will likely benefit you because then you will have dealt with the person directly, no he-said or she-said, and the other people close to you don't know all the details. This is especially hard to do with spouses or boyfriends/girlfriends. Because every time you tell a sister or mom or brother or friend something about the other person that really grated your cheese, they remember it. They might not see all the other good things the person does. So if you are considering getting back together with someone or whatever, the people you've told about your relationship's trials and tribulations will only remember the complaining that you did, and they will wonder why you're so daft as to actually think about putting yourself together with someone who did this, that, or the other thing to hurt you (or that you plain old didn't like) previously. I hate to tell you this, but this is what therapy, or strangers on airplanes are for. (I'm not trying to trivialize therapy. I'm just saying, sometimes, the point is that you tell a stranger who doesn't know any of the people involved so you can sort your feelings out by talking about it. Sometimes strangers on the plane really won't cut it -- there is no substitute for a good therapist.)

Rule number three: when someone, or a piece of bad information, does blindside you, and you feel a cornerstone is being ripped away unexpectedly, remember that it's okay to cry. It's okay to FEEL. It's okay to be mad at someone, and to tell them about it. In fact, feeling is preferable to being numb. I know it doesn't always feel that way at the time...but feelings are a blessing. It proves you're not a rock, or an island, you're a human being. Try to really feel it, ride it out, and then do everything in your power to move on. It might take a few cycles of crying or howling in rage or feeling really, really sorry for yourself, but still, do your best to move on and choose to look for ways to smile instead.

Rule four: take some time and do something nice for someone else. If you're feeling needy, try to forget yourself for awhile and think about someone else. It will probably snap you out of your doldrums and make you realize that you are not the only person with problems, thereby making you feel slightly better.

Rule five: Be quiet within yourself. Take time to be grateful for the things you have. Try not to be bitter about the things you don't have (like the fact that you're currently missing one or more cornerstones and you feel like the Leaning Tower of Pisa.). Sometimes, to get to that place of quiet, you need to exorcise the feelings in you. Writing is often the best way to do that. So write things down in a negative journal that you never go back and read. My art history teacher told me once that people are more likely to write in their journals when bad things are happening in their life. I was talking to my mom the other day and she mentioned a time that was really hard for her...my sister and I were both home for a period of a few months. Neither of us had jobs, and we were both erstwhile students. We were both sick, and so our spirits were down. We were crabby in general, and fought a lot. Mom said it was one of the hardest periods of her life to have two grown squabblers on her hands all the time. (After all, it's not really like she could put us in time out.) I don't really remember any of that. But what I do remember is that during that time, I wrote in my journal. Every day. I went through several pens and wrote a lot of nonsense. And every night as I wrote to myself, I thought, "Mr. Hall, you were right." Writing down things is good catharsis. But limit the time...don't let trying to think of the perfect way to describe your anguish take up any more mental energy. Just get it out. It doesn't have to be pretty, just get it done, and then move on.

That's a lot of rules, and it's hard not to feel like you're an exception to all the rules when you're feeling down and having a Hard Time. But hard times will pass. Just have faith, ride it out, and think, "tomorrow is a new day, with no mistakes in it." Have feelings. Forgive yourself, and others, if necessary. People come and go in your life, and bad stuff happens. But there are many things to smile about in a day, if we just look around at the people around us.

I heard a talk awhile ago that made me think of this. I don't always like this speaker's topics, but this time, something really resonated with me and I sometimes make a joke about it as I tell people in gross understatement: "Hope ya know, I had a hard time."

Golden Gardens

Tonight I went to Golden Gardens, at the suggestion of The Conrad, who sadly wasn't actually there with me. The weather was beautiful, and although it was a little late by the time we actually got there, it was still gorgeous. I didn't even need a jacket until 8:15!

Even though The Conrad was stuck at work, Ronnster and RoJo and others were there with me. I burned my accounting book in effigy. It took a long time to burn. That class took a long way to burn itself out of my system, too.

We sat on the beach, and made some s'mores. (I had 0.5, which was 0.5 too much.) We talked and laughed and sang. And there were hugs. And trains in the background. And the whooshing of the tide as it crept in. And a ukelele. And I wore my sweatshirt, my "bonfire" sweatshirt...the one I never wear  unless it's a bonfire. I wash it every time, afterwards, but I'm sure it still has bonfire smell embedded in it.

It was lovely, and I loved seeing my friends, getting hugs, and laughing so much.

Cheers to friends. Cheers to summer. Cheers to no more accounting book.

Blood and Water -- Naturally

There's a saying that blood's thicker than water. I don't know if it actually is thicker, but I had an experience lately that made me think about it.

First, if you don't like blood, don't read this.

Second, I apologize in advance to the other party in this blog post. I hope she can forgive me for talking about something that is very personal, and not generally talked about in public. If she reads it and doesn't like it, I might take it down. But I believe the point will come clear, and perhaps she will not be mad.

Awhile ago I was visiting a sister of mine. (She's my blood. We used to tease her that her legs were painted on because she used to ask us to go get water for her when she was thirsty, instead of getting her water for herself:::Blood. Water. Blood was thicker, so we always ended up getting her water for her, even if sometimes it was with some grumbling.)

I was in the middle of my period. Sometimes, accidents happen, and things get bled on. I bled on her sheets. It's the kind of thing that if it has to happen away from home, I suppose it's best to have it happen at a sister's house, because hopefully, she's understanding, and it's slightly less embarrassing to go tell her, "Hey! I'm trying to take care of this problem, but we need to do laundry. Now." than it is to tell a stranger or an acquaintance.

I woke up and rolled over and realized what had happened and inwardly groaned. Great! How embarrassing. I went to tell her what had happened. She was very understanding and wasn't mad at all or impatient. I was really grateful, as I felt a little silly. I told her as much, and she told me a story I had completely forgotten about.

A long time ago, when I was a pretty young teenager, we went to visit somebody. I want to say Aunt M was part of it, but I don't remember that for sure. I do remember I had recently been through puberty, and I was having a rough go of it. (Most people do, so I don't really feel too sorry for myself about it.) My sister was sitting on my lap. My lap was bigger than her lap, and there weren't enough seats, and I was not yet old enough to care about having no leg circulation. She sat on my lap and I put my arms around her, and we chatted with our relatives (or whoever it was) for awhile. It was summertime, because I was wearing shorts.

When she stood up, I realized that she had bled through her clothes onto my lap, and there was a rusty stain on the fabric of my shorts. She must have been perched at the end of my lap, because even though my shorts were pretty long, it was close to the hemline. I remember thinking, "Oh no. How embarrassing for her!" and I wanted to let her know that she needed to change her clothes, but I didn't want to make a big deal out of it and embarrass her any more than was absolutely necessary. Mentioning it in front of all our relatives (probably not everybody in the room was female, and it would have greatly mortified me to point it out in mixed company) would have been really rude, I felt, and embarrassed her.

It never occurred to me to get mad or cause a scene. I was just anxious for her to get full understanding of the situation so she could take steps accordingly. So when she stood up, I tugged on her hand to get her attention, pointed to the stain to let her know what had happened, and then rolled the hem of my shorts up in a little cuff in order to cover the stain. It wasn't a natural place for a bloodstain to be, and I didn't want anyone else to notice. For once in my life, I believe I actually acted nonchalant!

She said she was so grateful that I didn't make a big deal of it. I guess I could have squealed and been like, "Eeeew, she bled on me!" and made a fuss. But really...I just rationalized it: Everybody has things about their bodies they can't control. She couldn't control that, and besides, it's not like any damage was done, so I just went about my day and changed my shorts later.

She told me this story as she put hydrogen peroxide on the stain I had just made, and kind of made the point that I could bleed on anything I wanted, because she was really grateful that I hadn't freaked out on that day. It made me think. To me, it wasn't a big deal at all, but to her, she was grateful to be spared mortification.

We need both blood and water. We need people--our "blood"--to take care of us and get us out of sticky wickets, and we need water to get rid of the residue. When we have waterworks, it's our blood who take care of us. When we bleed, it's sometimes the water of acceptance -- which sometimes we do not offer freely enough to our blood -- that we need to flow around us and clean us up.

So, my dear sister, blood and water go together -- naturally. And so next time you ask me for a glass of water, I'll get it for you without complaining. Because I'm your sister -- your blood. And that's just one of the things sisters do for each other.

Good Love

I wanna know what love is / I want you to show me / 
I wanna feel what love is / I know you can show me / 
Here I go again / Here I go again 

I went to Texas for a glorious week and a half. I had such a good time. There was:

good food :: for Outings, the peach donut was probably my favorite, although the salted caramel shake at the Alamo Draft House is really hard to beat. For Innings, hands down, it was the Beef Book!! Sooooo yummy.
good movies :: I saw A Christmas Story for the first time, and although I'm not sure this can qualify as truly "good," I now get the leg lamp references. I also saw The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug, Muppet Christmas Carol,  and Better Off Dead, as well as the Christmas episode of ISWAK. 
good games :: Whoowasit? was my favorite new game. I think I played it five times. (!) We had an entire game marathon, playing classics like Monopoly and Labyrinth, and oldies like Apples to Apples and Ticket to Ride: Europe. I also like Make n Break, and the addition of Enchanted Forest was good, too.
good conversations :: like only sisters can have. Of course, those devolved into random memory remembrances and also a lip sync contest. Which turned into a next-day karaoke contest. Apparently I have more rocker in me than W thought. Hehe. Just remember, W, that the louder I sing, the more comfy I am.
good books :: I read Murphy's Boy on the plane, and it was good. I also read the entirety of James and the Giant Peach to the kids in less than three days. There were also some forgettable books, but we won't mention them here (although one of them was a misbegotten choice of a Dan Brown book), so they will be forgotten.
good love :: I got hundreds of kisses, and hundreds of hugs, and hundreds of "I love you's."
Life really does not get much better than that.

When I was in the car, on the way to the airport, IGPM reached over and just held my hand. It almost made me cry. I thought to myself, "this is what love is. Love is reaching out for another person and knowing that they will welcome your touch...whether they need reassurance, or they are the one doing the reassuring."

He knew he could reach for my hand and that I would let him lace my fingers between my own. He didn't have to say anything. No explanations were necessary. My niece knows she can kiss my cheek any time and I will be happy to receive it. She is confident that if she extends her graceful neck toward me, I will meet her.

Love is mostly knowing that the other person will be there...that they'll meet you in the middle, that they'll reach out to you when you're scared or hurt, that they'll let you reach out to them when they're in a pickle or need some help.

My Christmas present was good love. Can't ask Santa Claus for a much better present than that!!

First Day of School

Mom used to take us shopping downtown at the zicmee. We were lucky girls; we went to Nordstrom to get our shoes, GAP to get our jeans, and to the food court for lunch in between. There was just one shopping day a year. Of course, that doesn't count all the time we spent looking at catalogs from Lands' End and LLBean. But in terms of physical shopping, Mom took us a few weeks before and we had our shopping day and bought our new school shoes, and pants, and that was it. There was usually a separate trip for school supplies - we had a $5 budget, and after that, anything else we wanted, we had to pay for out of our allowances. (Back then, $5 went a bit further than it does now.)

If I were still in public school, today would be my first day back.

If I were Kathleen Kelly, I would make Joe Fox deliver on his promise to buy me a "bouquet of freshly sharpened pencils."

Somehow, today I am remembering something that happened more than twenty years ago. (!)

Mom bought me a big pink/magenta tote bag. It was huge. It was supposed to be my school bag. I have no idea what in the world I could possibly have put in there to fill it up. Heck, you could have put ME in there and still been able to zip it up. I don't know what possessed me to ask for it. It was made of nylon and had black handles.

This year, I was to start Kindergarten, so I wanted to be extra super specially prepared. I had been waiting for this moment - the moment where I could be like everybody else in their school-going glory - for so long! (I used to invent "homework" for myself so I wouldn't be left out when my older sibs were doing theirs. Yep. I was one of those kids.)  Mom had taken me shopping and I had bought new shoes. I wanted to keep them pristine for the beginning of school, so I elected not to wear them. But then I had some wavering thoughts, and I wanted to wear them beforehand, and I couldn't find them. It wasn't long before the week before school approached and we were doing our back-to-school breakfast routine...but still, no K-shoes were to be found.

These shoes were black canvas Keds and had polka dots of color on them. It was the late 80s gone bad: purple, yellow, orange, green, turquoise dots spotted the landscape. I couldn't find them, and I couldn't find them, and I couldn't find them...and then, the Saturday before school started, I had gotten desperate, and I was beginning to wonder where those shoes could have gone. By this time, it wasn't just that I wanted to wear the shoes, I was beginning to worry about the Wrath of Mom, as well, if I couldn't come up with them.

As soon as the pink monstrosity of a bag -- also the only pink accessory I have ever owned -- had been procured, I had carefully filled it with my school supplies long ago and hung it up on my hook in the closet, mostly to keep it from being poached by other family members. Now, as I was preparing to add the finishing touches of School Supplydom, I took the bag off the peg, because I'd organized my pencil box and wanted to put it in, so I would be ready, steady for the big day.

The bag wasn't empty though. Nope. I had, in my infinite planning mode, picked out exactly what I was going to wear to school on my first day, probably the very day that my new shoes were purchased, and had, in my squirreliness, stowed it carefully away in order to "reserve" the outfit for the monumental occasion. (Not being in charge of the laundry schedule, I probably had concluded that it would be best to be on the safe side and just not try to put it through any cycles until the Big Day had arrived.) I'm sure I pretended I was Anne of Green Gables and laid out  every combination of clothing I owned on my bed, and likely had my sisters help me pick what to wear.

I had rolled each piece of my outfit up carefully into little tubes, and shoved my socks inside my shoes. Why rolling, you ask? We had been instructed by Aunt E that the *only* way to pack things was to roll them up, because it preserved space and kept things from getting too wrinkly. She was sage (she had been to London!!), and besides, she was part of the Best Auntie duo, and so her word was practically gospel truth, bordering on law. There were my favorite pants! I rejoiced. I had completely forgotten that I had "reserved" the outfit, and I practically wept for relief, knowing that I had a good outfit and that I wouldn't have to go tell Mom I had lost my shoes.

I immediately put the outfit on, to try it on one last time, to make sure it had the magic a first day would need; but it will be completely unsurprising to more than a few of you to learn that, upon being tried on, my brand new shoes fit just a little too tight for comfort.

Of course, I wore them anyway! After all, a girl must have new shoes for the first day of school.

"I like your shirt."

Rule #1: If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all.
Rule #2: If you can't say something that would sound nice on paper without snarling in anger or jealousy when you utter words, don't say anything at all.
Rule #3: Run the filter three times before speaking...kind of like Mom's "how many times you must wash the vegetables before eating them" rule.

This morning, I was thinking about being warm. My phone says it's 43 degrees outside. In the motherland, and Austin, and (it seems) pretty much everywhere else, it's 73 degrees (or higher). I wore a coat to work today. And I wished I had another blanket last night. Being 1 blanket short is never fun.

Thinking about being warm made me think about two days ago, when it was warm, and I complimented someone on her shirt. It was cute -- a salmon baby-doll style contraption I probably would wear if it was in my closet. And then I thought about warm summer nights on the porch in the homeland.

Thinking about warm summer nights on the porch in the homeland, and shirt compliments made me think of An Incident.

About ten years ago I was sitting with a boy on a porch on a warm night. It was his porch, not mine...though we had spent many hours sitting on my porch. It was a fairly rare occurrence for me to be sitting on his porch, and I didn't really love to do it, as the first time I did, I got stung by a bee, right between the eyes. But that's another story for another blog post.

*Background: He always sat to my left. I always leaned against the post. Eventually, I would move down from the top stair and start dead-heading the petunia bush that mom always kept by the front planter. We would talk until it was time for him to go home or until he got bored of sitting still and wanted to go for a walk or a drive.*

Earlier that evening, I had been telling him a story about a mutual friend of mine.

**Interruptus: I was in high school when this happened, and I could be kind of mean-spirited. Please keep the folly of youth in mind as you read this. Also, I hope everyone in the story forgives me for telling it here.)**

The story went like this: A few weeks ago, I had been walking with said friend in the foyer of our high school. A boy I had known for years, but who was a relative unknown to her, approached her and started talking to her.

**Interruptus: Looking back, he reminded me of Napoleon Dynamite. He wore sweats to school four days out of five, and moon boots every day in the winter. This particular day, he was wearing a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles shirt that had definitely seen better days, and a pair of green sweats. He was tall and gangly, and had Nerd with a capital N written all over him. He's the sort of guy who will never let go of his LEGO collection and can be a little awkward in social situations, but has phenomenal brainpower and can solve crazy hard math problems in his head. He'll probably win awards someday, if he hasn't already. I liked him -- liked to talk to him, and I thought he was interesting, though at the time, I thought of him as an intellectual equal and not as a creature with a y chromosome...if that makes sense.**

The boy approached my friend, who is very pretty. He said "hi" to her. I'm not sure he looked her in the eye -- he rarely did so with anyone, and I got the impression that he liked her, so he would have been intimidated. He was probably looking at a spot just over her shoulder or at the floor. (This girl, it should be known, was so captivating that one time when she was out, her date was so busy staring at her that he forgot to drive, and subsequently was in a minor car accident, which put a slight damper on their outing.)

My friend looked at him and said, "Hi," in her friendly way, and then she said something that (at the time) completely flabbergasted me: "I like your shirt." I don't remember his response. I just remember thinking..."what the ?!?!?! Girl, what are you thinking? His shirt has at least three holes in it, and considering he was probably at least half a foot taller than he was when his mom bought it for him, it isn't the most glamorous of looks." He moved away, past us, down the hall toward the band room (which thankfully I only had occasion to enter twice in my whole high school career) and I turned to my friend and said, "Did you really like his shirt?" I couldn't help it. It seemed completely incredulous to me that this girl, who had probably never even seen an episode of TMNT in her life, would be complimenting his shirt. Her reply, "No. But he looked like he needed a compliment."

I think my jaw dropped. The idea of telling someone you liked his shirt when you didn't actually just seemed to be sticky icky...a form of lying. If you think he needs a compliment, tell him you dig his curly hair, or tell him you like his posture, or tell him it's good to see him, or tell him something that's true...but don't tell him you like his old ratty shirt when you really don't. It could be his favorite, yes. But you're not doing yourself, or him, any favors by making false statements.

Interruptus: People who know me know that I'm not shy to give compliments to people about their clothes. I'll tell strangers in the elevator I love their coat, or shoes, or luggage. I'll tell people I hardly know that the color of their shirt matches their eyes. I'll walk past guys at church and make eye contact and then move my fingers down my chest in an outline of a tie and make a thumbs up. But only if I really like the article of clothing!!! Perhaps I am so free with compliments in part because of this friend; although I did not/do not necessarily agree with her method, I did appreciate the fact that she thought about someone else and what kind of day he/she was having and if he/she needed a pick-me-up, and my friend wanted to help.

So I was sitting on this boy's porch, telling him this story, and laughing a little about it...asking, "why would she have done that?" And then, out of nowhere, the girl (who happened to like the owner of the porch I sitting on...most of the time) drove up. The boy and I looked at each other. (He happened to like her back...most of the time). He was wearing a red shirt with the logo of a nearby university on it (#1), which had a bitter rivalry with another nearby university (#2)...and her family were staunch University #2 fans. The look on her face as she got out of the car and walked toward us was priceless. She clearly was wondering what I was doing there, and why I was sitting on the porch with him. (There was at least two feet of space between us, as there always was whenever we Porchified.) She seemed a little irritated, but seemed equally determined to hide it. She walked up the sidewalk toward his house and said, "Hey, (boy). I like your shirt." If the word "shirt" was venom, it probably would have been lethal-injection grade if she had been close enough to get the needle in.

It was horrible.

It was horrible, because sometimes the Sneaky Snark comes out of me. I really don't like it when it does. But this time I let it slip out: I turned to him and said with a straight face, "Yes, (boy). I like your shirt." Between my tone, and a raised eyebrow, the boy got what I was digging at and we started to laugh hysterically. I had literally just finished telling my tale of shirt-liking-fakery, and then she appeared, and told he of the university #1 shirt that she liked his shirt in a tone that said she didn't care a flying fig about his shirt, but she wanted to know what he was doing sitting there with me. And it was even more horrible because she had no idea why we were laughing. I couldn't very well tell her, but I knew she would ask, and "nothing" was definitely going to be an insufficient answer, in addition to being untrue. I said something that slightly mollified her, but I still felt horrible inside. At least she had good intentions when she told TMNT boy that she liked his shirt. I was being nothing but petty by telling Boy She Liked about the story. (There were lots of relationship politics between the three of us. Frankly, it would take too long to detail, and I really don't want to go there.)

I don't remember if I got up to leave, or if she did, or if the three of us sat there awkwardly (for it surely could have been nothing but awkward) for awhile. I am kind of glad I don't remember.

So, for Rule #1, it's okay to compliment. Just mean whatever you say.
Rule #2 is still a challenge sometimes. Sarcasm in all its forms is a touchy thing, and should be used sparingly.
Rule #3 will help with both Rule #1 & #2, and will help you avoid feeling horrible like I did at the end of The Incident because I was snarky in response to someone not following Rule #2.

But you can be sure that if I ever tell you I like your shirt, I really do like it.