Notes, Quotes and Last Night's Dinner

Whenever friends visit my house they often comment on the notes and messages that Mother has placed around the place. On the back of the toilet door are wise statements from the Dalai Lama, Phillip Adams’ modern take on the Ten Commandments, a quote on success by Ralph Waldo Emerson and an excerpt on the value of time by Someone Not That Great. On the fridge there are all sorts of clever WITTICISMS such as “there are two options for dinner: take it or leave it”, “raising teenagers is like trying to nail jelly to tree” and “you can’t scare me, I have children.” Father’s favourites include: “I’d kill for a Nobel Peace Prize”, “I once had a psychic girlfriend…she dumped me before we met” and “borrow money from pessimists, they won’t expect it back”. There are also some intellectual quotes to match the gems of wisdom displayed on the back of the toilet door: “isn’t it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to say there are fairies at the bottom of it too” by Douglas Adams on the existence of God; “we owe almost all of our knowledge not to those who have agreed but to those who have disagreed” by Charles Colton and that poem by Dylan Thomas that Stewie Griffin quotes.

I collectively stare at these sentiments on an average of 37 minutes a day. While I’m eating last night’s dinner for breakfast, while I’m eating more of last night’s dinner for lunch, while I’m snacking, while I’m on the toilet expelling breakfast, lunch and snacks. They bring me wisdom and social and spiritual grounding in times of mental vacancy, spiritual boredom and lack of social interaction.

Notes are taken seriously in my household. Almost every morning when I wake up, Mum will have left me an informative note about where tonight’s dinner is (usually “in the fridge”) or a fun suggestion for things I can do if I get bored (“make dinner”, “clean your bathroom” or “vacuum and mop the entire house.” These suggestions are clearly invaluable to curing my boredom and taken seriously). Mum once had Dad LAMINATE a message that said “Please put dirty dishes in the dishwasher” and kept it on the sink for several weeks.

After surfacing from my room just then, to see if any of last night’s quinoa was left in the fridge, I discovered another pearl of wisdom left next to the sink by dear Adele. This is by far the most insightful and useful message yet.