The Art of Being Uninformed and Opinionless

If you have read the title and want to tell me there is no such word as opinionless, I already know. Or at least spell check has been rather forceful in pointing it out to me. But, I have tried other "grammar correct" versions and none of them resonate with me in the the same satisfying way opinionless does. So, I'm leaving it. My spell check doesn't like Fuckery either and we all know that's a word, so there is precedent. 

I learned a lot about myself this year. Some days too much, and many days too little I'm sure. But I did learn who I was. In all the good and bad ways, I learned who I was. And more importantly I learned who I was not. 

I learned that I have a great capacity for empathy, but struggle often with sympathy. I learned that the difference between those two is both a fine line and a great divide. I learned that most people don't understand the difference. They should, we should, it would make a profound difference in our country. I am working on the sympathy. I know I need to fix this.

We are headed toward the normal everyone has so desperately  craved for 13 months, or we aren't depending on who you are, what you believe and what normal even meant to begin with. None of the normal or moving on means much if you don't take the lessons from this last year and do something with them. Not an original idea, it's stolen from the recently disgraced Andrew Cuomo (And yes. I am aware we are like one news cycle out from finding out he kills baby kittens in his basement and steals from the elderly at church. Lesson learned. I am nothing if not self reflective. I do enjoy that he has surpassed the sadness and shame I was holding on to over supporting John Edward's and his eventual total lack of moral character, but this is an article for another day). 

The lesson that I am going to take and move forward is this...there is an art to being uniformed and less opinionated. And I realized that I am at an age where I can thrive in this art.

I have recently taken up tennis. I am older than the women in my group lesson. They are women who are finding that their children are a little less demanding then they used to be and they, in turn, are finding a little time for themselves. But the children are all still school age. After a recent lesson the talk turned to pandemic school fuckery and they all had strong opinions and everyone was worked up in her own way, as they should be it has been a long year. I had opinions too, but stayed quiet. Eventually someone asked me something. I paused, I was quiet and slow to answer (that poor Joe Biden gets a bad rap for this, but a little pause and thought can go a long way ) and then I said something fairly vague and short. 

And in that moment I realized that I didn't need to have an opinion here. Even as a former school teacher and mother of four, I did not need to have an opinion here. On the car ride home I realized it was the beauty of where I was in life. It was the beauty of what I had learned about who I was and who I was not over this last year. I did not need to have an opinion. Well, I needed to have an opinion, maybe more correctly put I did not need to SHARE my opinion. I could be opinionless in this situation.

This was a huge revelation of freedom for me. Really not one woman in that moment needed to hear my opinion on this. Not one. And my opinion, while incredibly amazing and informed and relevant, was not necessary for any of these women to go forth with their day and lives.  

And that is my quest for the next year, this post pandemic year. I am going to move toward and settle into the art of being uninformed and opinionless  (spoken out loud opinions) in more group settings. I'm going to  take the long slow breath and be brief and vague when answering. My opinions can come when I write and people can choose to read them, or not. Or with good friends and family once in awhile, but they aren't needed in every social situation or group setting.  

As we come to the other side of what I once called the quiet chaos of pandemic life, I am left with this feeling of gratitude. I made decisions early for myself and my family about how I would handle things, what I would do, what was important for us and hoped I (we) came out the other side as the person I wanted to be and the family I wanted to raise. I dug deep. It's a work in progress, but I feel gratitude for where we are.

My high schooler goes back to school in a week. I have no opinion on this. I hope its a great end to Junior year for her. College girls will go back in the fall. I am grateful to see them return to in person class in a safe environment. In July we will go to see our oldest get her White Coat for PA school rotations. 

We are vaccinated. Mostly vaccinated. I have one who just qualified and one who has to wait awhile after a positive Covid test. Some people will get vaccinated, some will not. I guess it depends on what your opinion is and how you want to handle it. 

We were masked this year. I am suffering the effects of some very bad "maskme (mask acne)" after a long travel day of double masking as we speak. This year I wasn't sick at all and as a lifetime severe allergy sufferer, I had no allergy attacks. It was wonderful and I didn't realize how bad those attacks are until I went without them for a year. So, honestly, I will be masked in certain situations from here forth. People can do with that what they want. 

I gave up Facebook for lent. I was an over poster. I was bored during the pandemic and on way too much. I was bothered by people and their opinions and lack of empathy and sympathy. I would flip flop between  trying to engage people in thoughtful discussions and then giving my opinion where it wasn't needed. I was reading peoples strong opinions on things and getting irritated. I was an extreme Facebook moron really.

I'm not sure what my relationship with Facebook is moving forward. But, I learned that my frustration with it was all on me and how I behaved. So, I'm hoping to take my new journey with the Art of Being Uninformed and Opionless and apply it to Facebook in whatever I way I chose to return. 

Tomorrow is Easter Sunday. We will be outdoors at our church and then it will just be what I call The Lodi 3. Always strange for me to think about such a small celebration. Tonight Corey and I will watch Moses on TV for the 27th year in a row. I will not be sharing this article with him immediately as I am not very far in my journey of uninformed and opinionless in my marriage. But I'm going to try harder. 

I wish you all an after pandemic year of less information and fewer opinions!