MAMACADABRA

You know when you decide to do something and you know in your heart of hearts it’s a bad idea?  Not only a bad idea, but likely a really bad idea?

When I was ten I was invited to a birthday party for one of my girlfriends.  Her birthday party was an all weekend affair and it involved camping and fishing.  Two words that were rarely uttered in my household.  I believe my mom’s exact words when discussing the outdoors were “my idea of camping is a Holiday Inn.”  Which in retrospect is crazy, because we were not highfalutin or fancy, nor did we have much money.  But one thing was for certain and that was that we DID NOT camp.

I remember not really wanting to go, but feeling like I’d miss out if I didn’t, so hesitantly my mom sent me off (I remember it as hesitantly but I would venture to guess that anytime my mom could get five minutes without me on a weekend it was like a huge coup) with my sleeping bag to a weekend camping trip.

A.  Weekend.  Camping.  Trip.

The first night of the weekend we were to sleep in tents.  I don’t have any recollection of the evening but I assume we did things like make s’mores and run around the campground causing trouble.  There is a reason I don’t remember what we did that night.  We went to sleep in our tent, a tent full of little girls, and we were awoken by a loud clap of thunder.  It’s then that we realized the tent was no longer filled with just little girls.  We were also surrounded by hundreds…HUNDREDS…of frogs.  Next to us, on top of us, sharing pillows with us, and in some cases sharing sleeping bags with us.

What.  The.  F-ck???

We screamed like we were being murdered violently and my girlfriend’s mom and her boyfriend came running.  Apparently someone had not zipped the tent door all the way around, and when the rain started falling, every frog in a five-mile radius took refuge in our dry tent.  Which, by the way, was also no longer dry.

They got all of the frogs out of our tent, or so they said, but I refused to go back to sleep in there.  I was sure they had missed some and I was not about to wake up to frogs again.  My girlfriend’s mom offered to let me sleep in her tent so I shook out my sleeping bag and overnight bag and hustled over to their tent.  When I woke up my girlfriend’s mom was gone, and I was snuggled next to her creepy boyfriend, and it was…completely inappropriate awkward.

Now…the frogs in the tent would have been enough to scar me for life…but it didn’t end there.  From the campground we went to my girlfriend’s grandparent’s house.  They lived on a lake and had a fishing trip planned for us.  We went out on a pontoon and they were kind enough to bait my hook for me and all I had to do was sit with my fishing pole in the water.  Turned out that I had a knack for catching sunny fish.  Who knew?

Furthermore, who knew that my girlfriend’s CRAZY A-S grandmother would make us skin EVERY fish we caught?  With a spoon?  Because I sure as hell didn’t.  Otherwise, you know, I would have purposely caught none.  Instead of three.

So I guess it’s no shock that this trip didn’t change my mind about camping.

When you’re an adult you’re supposed to know better than to ignore those gut feelings.  You’re supposed to go with your instinct.  Right?  So why do we (I) so often question our (my) own intuition about things?

Today, ironically, as I was fixing one of the last things I did against my better judgement (my hair) I did two more things against my better judgement.  One, completely ridiculous (and maybe a funny story), the other a little worrisome.

Maybe.  A.  Funny.  Story.  My husband and I have a “hair girl” that comes to us.  My husband is a girl when it comes to his hair.  He used to see this lovely girl at a salon, but when she started having babies she quit working at the salon, but continued to do his hair on the side.  I used to think it was so weird until I had her do mine once and realized she’s really really good.  Tonight she came to cut both our hair and to color mine back to blonde.  We were in a time crunch so while I would normally shower and wash my hair color out and she would cut my husband’s hair, tonight I needed to be faster than that.  So I washed it out in the kitchen sink.  Only, I hadn’t done that since I was a kid.  So, against my better judgement, I asked my lovely husband if there was any way he’d consider helping me.  And likely against his better judgement, he did just that.  It seemed so sweet at the time.  He was gentle, and worried about water temperature, and again at the time it seemed like the nicest thing he could do for me.  Both me and the hair girl told him to please use more shampoo and way more conditioner than normal.  And he said he did.  And then he left for the gym.  And left me to get my hair cut.  But it couldn’t be cut until all of the snarls were combed out.  Which took forever because, as it turns out, he hardly put any conditioner in.  And once that hell was over, and it was cut, she dried it using a round brush to style it.  And the stubborn snarls made me feel like a toddler who had dipped her head in syrup and let it dry and then had it brushed out with a metal brush.  And it hurt so bad I was actually nauseous for a little bit.  So, yeah, the next time I think I’ll maybe just wash it myself.

A.  Little.  Worrisome.  I was asked to give my “gut” feeling about a pending sale today.  I was asked additional questions that led me to believe that this pending sale may be recorded as a pledge.  As in…I think someone is telling someone that the client said the sale was approved.  And I’m kind of freaking out about it.  And the minute the question was asked I knew I should not be giving any answer other than “gosh I just don’t know, we’ll have to wait and see.”  But instead I said “yes I THINK they will move forward with this sale.”  And when asked if I expected it to be a multi-year commitment I knew I should have said “again, I’m just not sure.”  But instead I said “that is the conversation we had so IF they move forward with the sale I’d venture to guess that it would be multi-year.”  And then I thought to myself ‘something is going on and this sh-t is going to get me fired.’  Sh-t.

TODAY:  What if I listen more carefully to my own intuition?  What if I do a better job of trusting my gut?

PS – On a lighter note, my hair is fantastic!!!

PPS – My husband is so very lovely and I appreciate his willingness to try to help.  For Christ’s sake people…he washed my hair.  Perhaps incorrectly but still!