When did it all go wrong...

ok

It all went wrong that time I said something on ilx that I thought was straightforward and fairly innocuous, but that some other ilxors strongly objected to.

it went wrong for me when the Eastern front fell. Up until then, I was confident that I could win a two-front war. but afterward, clearly at least one of those fronts had fallen, and I had lost the confidence of my troops

(x post)

Was it this one - Is there life on other planets? ?

Martin's not able to respond ow, so let's pass that one by.

Having just returned from a weeklong multi-generational family gathering in a big remote farmhouse, I am equipped with multiple possible answers to this question: It all went wrong when my mother felt compelled by social pressures and her own lack of confidence to marry my father (they're still married, 55 years on, but my mom makes relentlessly clear that it wasn't her idea); or maybe when my dad's parents were remote and judgmental toward their children; or possibly when my grandfather's father abandoned the family when my grandfather was very young, leading to him growing up with a bunch of resentment and hurt that he passed onto his own kids.

Were earlier generations still around to make their case, I'm sure we could push the original sins back much farther. (And to be clear, I love my family, I mostly have good relationships with them, and I think they all mean well, most of the time.) But it made me aware all over again that learning to let go of past pain and injuries is often the only way to deal with them, because you can't solve or fix them after the fact even if everyone involved is still alive. And also of course that "letting go" is tremendously difficult work, and something you generally have to do over and over and over.

otmfm

Yeah, that's otm for me too.

And made me think of Larkin's Winter Palace:

Most people know more as they get older:
I give all that the cold shoulder.

I spent my second quarter-century
Losing what I had learnt at university

And refusing to take in what had happened since.
Now I know none of the names in the public prints.

And am starting to give offence by forgetting faces
And swearing I've never been in certain places.

It will be worth it, if in the end I manage
To blank out whatever it is that is doing the damage.

Then there will be nothing I know.
My mind will fold into itself, like fields, like snow.

possibly when I had teh racist couple next door move in.

Possibly when I had started cutting things at the start of the year but only finished 2 shirts and got halfway through a 3rd.

POssibly when I never got into a cleaning routine and now its too hot to start one.

Probably never getting into an exercise routine.

Probably sitting in the sun over the weekend without thinking of sunscreen.