I Have Always Done It This Way
I Have Always Done It This Way
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- Caucas’ / Foter / CC BY-NC-SA
Have you ever wondered why you make your bed the way you do? Why do you wash dishes in the order that you do – glasses, then plates, then silver, etc? Why do you sort the laundry the way you do – whites, colored, jeans, etc? Why do you place the toilet roll on the holder the way you do?
There may be very good reasons for doing things the way you do them. Your parents may have taught you to make your bed a certain way. Since then you have always done it that way. But have you ever wondered why you were taught to do it that way?
Here’s the reason for this whole subject. You have done things a certain way most of your life. Your significant other has done things a certain way most of their life. The problem is that your way and their way are different. Is there a right way? Who determines which way is ‘right’?
My husband and I have some things we do as a matter of routine. I have been set in some of my ways, but have learned to be more flexible. My husband has been making some changes now as well. It has taken him longer to come around to the idea that things don’t always have to be done a certain way and it is still fine.
My big ‘Ah Hah!” moment
Today I was changing the sheets on the bed and the question hit me, “Why do I need to make the bed this way?” I don’t. I was taught to make it this way. My mother worked in a hospital and when they made beds, they made ‘hospital corners’. I won’t go in to detail on just what those are, but we were taught to make our beds that way. If my husband made the bed, I would go back later and ‘fix it’. He made the bed perfectly well. There was nothing wrong with the way he did it. It just wasn’t the way I was taught to do it so I felt like I had to fix it. Yeah, I know. I can’t believe how long it took for this realization to finally hit me. Big sigh…
What about you? Have you had an ‘ah hah!’ moment with the way you do things? Have you had to have these discussions about what is the ‘right’ way to do certain things? How did you handle them?
Filed in: NaBloPoMo
I am firmly of the belief that toilet paper rolls are put on with the stream coming from the top. My wife is a bottom. The biggest debate lately has been the coupon vs coopon debate (spelling for emphasis). My kids for some odd reason picked how my wife says the word. Personally I say it the correct way, coupon.
I agree with you Jon. Toilet paper should come off the roll at the top, not the bottom. As for your pronunciation of coupon, sounds like you are in the minority in your household. You may have to rethink that one. LOL
You must have been reading my mind. I have been evaluating what I do as a routine. Some of it is necessary but some of it is just plain silly. The hard part is taking a life time of doing something and then changing it. Got any tips?
I once had a conversation with a young colleague who had been engaged several years and wondered how his life would change when he got married. I told him the biggest thing to get used to is that different households have routines they no longer even think about and children grow up thinking "everyone does it this way" until they get married and find out, for instance, that, say, your family always opened presents on Christmas Eve and his family always opened them Christmas morning. Negotiating these differences is what makes a new family.
I think I do many things my way because my mum did it that way and I have grown into my mother……………….lol
The way I make the bed and how the toilet paper roll has to fall over instead of under the roll are long leftover from the days when I cleaned hotel rooms in high school. Since I've been with my husband since I was 19, I think we pretty much trained each other how to do things, so we have never disagreed much on household stuff. We just do housework according to what suits us…. he cooks, I clean (expect vacuuming which he does). In the past few years, I am much better about being able to let things slide. If I'm going camping then thoroughly cleaning the house isn't going to happen that week. It tool me a long time to realize it really doesn't get much dirtier in two weeks than it does in just one 🙂
Cheryl I immediately started smiling. My grandmother always made the bed with hospital corners and I do to this day. My husband and I don't agree on how to place the sheets on the bed. Its weird but he says I put them upside down. I also fold my towels the same as my mom and don't get me started about getting toothpaste out of the tube.