Familiar - Pettiness

 I think I have figured it out again. I remember things well, but take for granted certain truths. When something becomes extremely familiar, I can't notice it anymore as easily.

Familiar: (adj.) 1. "Well known from long or close association." 2. "In close friendship; intimate."

So how can I describe something that I have known for so long and has probably changed so much over time?

[Because all things change in time. If not the object itself, my relationship to it changes through relativity with either itself, or the distance from everything else leaving us behind. To be at rest in relation to everything is to be stagnant, and movement is our signs of life. If I am not in motion in regards to things, I am at risk of being mistaken for being dead in my tracks.]

That parenthetical is not my main point, but a waypoint I have arrived at along the way. Related to the whole as support to where I am trying to reach.

And this is what inspires this. Parent and child. How an originating idea spawns smaller ideas along the way. How they relate to each other as each of them grows. Does the relationship between them become more tenuous as they branch out into their own further points? Will it become unwieldy and harder to recognize that one led to the other?

And it is questions like these that my mother asks me. It is answers that I give that frustrate her because they are not as blunt and quick as she would like to know. Some questions only lead to further branches of questions generated by her first question. As I try to distill what I know about some subject down to its simplest and most relevant state.

Because I care about being clearly understood. But occasionally, the method by which I am best able to reduce the opportunity of being misunderstood is to be comprehensive and long-winded. So here we are - I don't want you to get the wrong idea of what I am trying to say.

But there is a hazard in this comprehensive approach. In all the details provided, my audience may lose the thread and consider my explanation a labyrinth rather than a landscape.

So. I have brought my materials to the table so far. Thank you for your patience. My point is, rarely are things able to be both "simple" and "comprehensive". Even now, these words can be read differently.

Comprehensive: 1. "Complete, including all or nearly all elements or aspects of something." 2. "Relating to understanding."

See, the first use of it in the above paragraphs, I was thinking of the first definition - and to describe something in full can take a long time to communicate. The second definition? Well, that can be simple. Literally so, because people tend to think a "simple" concept as being very easily understandable or "easy to comprehend." But it is the assumption of a common understanding that leads to opportunities of the greatest misunderstanding. 

The things that go without saying are usually not said. Because that would be pedantic in the moment. Trying to explain something simply is very hard. Because it involves a level of precision, to be so exact and concise as to communicate in short time and words everything necessary to understand, not a word more or less. Emphasis on necessary. Which is a tricky concept because what is necessary is subjective from person to person.

Once again, I return to my relativity example in the parenthetical second paragraph. And relativity is relational. So when I am in a conversation, I have to figure out what my audience knows or holds in common with me in short steps. But this can be very difficult if I know a lot about the subject or the person to which I am talking. Because both of those relationships to knowledge and people took time to accumulate. And I have to figure out what is relevant given what I know about both. 

To which person am I speaking? It is easier to not update my impression of who I believe this person is in relation to me when I last checked. Because people are lazy and just eyeball the measurement as close enough. When you have seen something repeatedly over time, the edges and distinctions start to blur. It is like taking a long-exposure photograph. The subject is likely to move. And yet if I am taking the mental image of someone, it can be very upsetting if they have moved and now I can not define them as clearly and as simply in my mind. 

And, like in that Keane song I so enjoy and hold to be true: "Everybody's changing and I don't feel the same."

But this is the hazard with the familiar. If you don't pay attention to your relationship to it, it might flip on you and become unfamiliar. And discovering this is very disorienting to recognize.

And I am trying to be both general and specific in this post. To not list any particular grievances or place any blame along the way. Not because I am trying to hide something that exists, but rather I would prefer that anything resembling pettiness in my memories blur into being unrecognizable in my mind. I want to be a forgiving person who lets things go. I carry a lot of details in my mind because I find certain things interesting. And I don't want to have an interest in keeping perceived "wrongs" or "slights" that someone has placed on my path. Whether intentionally or unintentionally, my irritation with others in relation to me should be momentary. God is still working to shave off my rougher edges and I want to catch myself before I catch up against others and start friction. I would prefer if God changes me before I expect others to be changed by God's will to better suit me and my tastes.