I Still Don't Know How...

One of my favorite message boards had a new thread this weekend that I actually haven't got around to replying to. The topic was "Things you still don't know how to do, even though you're an adult."

The very first thing that comes to mind is properly tying my shoes. When I was very small someone tried to teach me that you wrap the lace around your thumb and then you do something else, then you perform magic complete with an incantation, and you end up with a tied shoe. I can't do that. I cross the laces and then make two bows, and tie those instead. Just like when I was five. It was to my relief a few years ago that I learned that this is not in fact, the "bunny ears method" because that's something else. Something even more babyish. Knowing that the method I use is called "the crossed Ian knot" does not do much to soothe my sadness at not being able to tie my shoes like an adult.

Another thing that comes to mind is being able to tell, definitively, when someone is being friendly, or subtly flirting; yes, I do mean someone, we'll talk about Kim the theater major who years later dated one of my bi friends some other time. I understand overt flirting (suggestive) but I tend to err on the side of friendly the rest of the time. Let me tell you a dumb story to illustrate this:
When I was 20, I was friends with a girl named Sarah. Sarah had a crush on a boy named Adam. Adam was a doofus, so I never paid him much attention. Somehow, Adam began to join me at breakfast before a lot of my 8 AM classes. I'm not a morning person, nor have I ever told anyone directly to go away, so I quietly endured his insistence that he eat with me. His annoying presence did give me an idea though: it seems like I could use that time to talk to him about Sarah. So, I did my best to steer the conversation towards her when possible, and tried to feel him out to see if he liked her. I didn't get the impression that he really did and it even seemed to annoy him, so I never said anything too enthusiastic about him when she and I talked about him. Later on, he asked me to sleep with him. I was surprised.
I can't say that I've progressed terribly much with figuring this sort of thing out since then - I try not to think about whether or not I miss out because of this, since that's too depressing.

The last thing, completely and wholly unrelated to either of the two previous, is that I still can't make fudge. This might be a good or bad thing depending on your perspective re weight, but I really like fudge. I can usually con my mom into making it once a year if I buy all the ingredients. It's the bubbling versus boiling thing that gets me. Either it doesn't set properly because I jumped the gun and thought it was boiling when it wasn't, or it has a rich smoky taste to it because I burnt the marshmallow by waiting too long. Someday I will get up the nerve to try it again on my own, despite the fact that it can be a very expensive mistake.

"I tried to tell you. You didn't know/I'm trying to make you feel the same" - Second Story Man, Cancer Dance