My last post about boxes mentioned that people should be bad at things. No one’s perfect, and no one is boring enough to be mediocre in everything.

We all need to embrace the things we do horribly and move on with our lives.

Although, that doesn’t mean we can’t take a moment to laugh at each other first.

Here are the 5 things I single-handedly (even double-handedly) cannot do.

1. Gardening

The 99c Store sells little potted plants. They tend to be as big as a mug and have teeny yellow or red or orange flowers on them. I think flowers are pretty. I’m a girl. I would love to decorate my room with flowers.

The plants always die. I water them faithfully. I make plant food. I put them in the sun on a timer so they get sun but not too much sun.

After my third attempt, it occurred to me that these flower plants? Are actually weeds with flowers in them. WEEDS.

I kill weeds. Literally.

2. Lemon Meringue Pie

My Soup-Pie is one of the posts that really kicked started me into my baking fails blog.  It came out . . . soup.

Then, the next Thanksgiving I attempted Soup-Pie Reincarnated, followed by Facing the soup pie and turning it into lemon meringue the year after that.

I’ll let you read my fails on your own. But all this to say, after three years of coming up with lemon soup, meringue cement, and chewy chunks custard, lemon meringue pie is one of those things I just can’t cut. (Pun intended.)

3. Styling Hair

I own a hair curler and a flat iron. I flatten my hair with the hair curler and curl my hair with the flat iron. I don’t understand it at all.

It was decided that I could cross Hairdresser off the list of career possibilities when I fried my forehead with a hair curler a few years ago. It was a spot the size of a quarter that was red and swollen and even showed lines of the grating as if I had rested my face on a hot mini barbecue wrack.

People are constantly looking at me and saying, “but Rebekah, your hair always looks so nice!” (Well, maybe not always.) But the truth is the final look of my hair is never what I was going for originally. Fail as a girl.

3. Eating right.

Goldfish crackers. Cookies. Pie. Chocolate peanut butter ice cream. Nutella. Barbecue potato chips.

That’s breakfast for me, followed by a few slices of sharp cheddar cheese because that’s “real” food, right?

I’ve never been a good eater. I’m a picky eater, and then all I want is dessert and seasoned french fries. This is one I’m working on since it’s necessary to living and breathing and all that good, remaining-a-warm-body stuff.

4. Hiding my emotions.

 

For whatever reason, when I’m taking pictures of myself, my expression tends to be the same; small variations on me having really big eyes.

My mother, having worked with kids basically all my life, is always saying how she’ll have a lot of wrinkles from the different crazy faces she makes. I don’t have the control on my expressions that she has (I barely just learned how to wink), but I’ve always been okay with only having a few facial expressions since that means only a few wrinkles.

But then it comes to me trying to hide what I’m really feeling or thinking and something goes wrong. Because the whole world knows.

When I’m holding back my sarcasm because what someone just said is absolutely ridiculous, you know. When I’m trying not to laugh, I’m still laughing, so you know. When I obviously don’t agree, you know. And if someone asks me if I want ice cream, I have no control over my eyes flicking up excitedly and a little smile appearing, so you’ll know.

I haven’t decided if this is a better or for worse thing.

And the last thing I really stink at is..

5. Keeping my room tidy

I am very much an Organized Chaos type of person. Drives just about everyone crazy.

I’m one of those people who walk into my room to be surprised to find it clean, as opposed to surprised to realize a huge mess appeared so soon.

My poor future husband.

I just stink at keeping it clean. I come home and change out of my work pants and habitually think, “why put these away? I have to wear them tomorrow anyhow” and it’s a downward spiral from there.

I realize it must be a huge shock to find out I’m not absolutely perfect after all. I’m sorry.

These five things are fairly common, but I think it’s healthy for all of us to sit down and write out a list like this every now and then. Acknowledge your imperfections and insecurities, decide whether to accept or fix them. And for the other kinds of us who are teetering on the insanity of thinking they can do everything perfect, it brings us down to reality’s level.

It’s an all-around good exercise, kids!

So I’d like to tag you, reader, to write a post of your own. What are you bad at? I’d love to know!