To ask for weird realisations you’ve had about life?

[goergia]

Things about mundane life that you’ve never given much thought but suddenly think “Now I think about it, that’s weird.”

I had one of these today. I live in a mid-terrace, neighbours are nice and quiet and we don’t hear a peep. A few days ago I had a snoop at one of the next-door neighbour’s house on Rightmove after seeing it was for sale, and realised that they have their bed right up against our party wall as I do mine. So even though I sleep in bed alone every night, there’s actually 2 people who I don’t really know just a couple of inches away from me! I don’t know why but for some reason it creeps me out. I’ve realised that in terraced houses you’re actually sharing one building with lots of people, many of whom you will NEVER interact with.

@PermanentTemporary
I know what you mean by that. When I was younger I learned that my friend's great grandfather was a junior chef on the Titanic. He was about 17 I think. Being a junior crewman and a teenager he was assigned to row one of the first lifeboats and picked up by the Carpathia. He didn't actually see anything that dramatic - when he left there was a still a long time until it actually sank and he only learned the scale of the tragedy days later. I already knew all about the Titanic but it was an incredibly strange feeling realizing I knew this actual person descended from someone who was there (and also - that not everyone there had the totally horrifying experience we think of, though I suppose most did).

@Sunshineboo

i think about when i die. how i will be in the middle of life - mid way through a series on tv, part way through a book, that sort of thing. life doesn't tie up and that freaks me out sometimes

Will now never read a book again. Could not bear to not reach the end of it.

Only slightly joking.

DrMorbius
I find it mind blowing that a spiral galaxy with millions stars, rotates at nearly 500,000 miles per hour.
Reminds me of this

@Terfydactyl Perhaps always have an unread book or someone telling you a story with a cliff-hangar to prevent you dying? Immortal Terydactyl if they can find enough good books.

As an aside, it appears Hep D is a super virus/defective virus that needs Hep B to reproduce/infect.

If you thought only rods and cones were the photo receptors in the human eye, there are 'intrinsically photosensitive retinal ganglion cells' which explained why some blind people with no functioning rods and cones could tend to know if it is day or night.

There’s actually only a few types of people in the world. You meet the same characters time and time again, just different bodies.

Another one who thought the people in charge worked for us, and if we didn’t want something it wouldn’t happen. That they knew what they were doing and had a plan. We weren’t a corrupt country, we really were “great” Britain.

HS2
Covid
And swapping of Ministers from roles to roles.
Blew that out the water

@EvilPea

regarding people types, I find it odd. Put a group or French, German and Scottish people separately in three rooms and they will tend to be recognisably similar to each other. Put the business people from all the countries in one room, the union officials in another and the farmers in the third and they will all be recognisably similar.

@Cloudhopping

That I will never truly feel like a proper grown up. I am 50 now and still have moments of surprise that I own a house, have children and can drive a car. I still feel like a child a lot of the time and not quite ready for it. I do wonder whether I’ll still feel like this in my 80’s and whether most older people feel this way.

You’re not alone. I’m in my 40s, senior and professional job, have a child, mortgage, all the rest. But sometimes when round my family I still feel like late teens or early 20s and not grown up. Particularly probably my humour and wondering how to deal with what life throws at you, which I thought I would have all figured out by now. My parents (at least how I remember them in their 40s) seemed to be more mature and adult but maybe that’s just how I remember things from a child’s perspective. My mum often does remark she’s stuck at 18 in her head, and she has a wonderfully youthful and humorous outlook on life.

I sometimes ponder how fickle our realities are and how the littlest thing can have major ramifications. This has usually happened when there’s been some major event. A guy I know died in a car crash on his way to work and I sometimes think how something as simple as brushing his teeth that morning for 10 seconds longer would have meant his car wasn’t in the exact spot it was and he would probably still be walking around today.

How if Hitler’s mother and father hadn’t got it on that particular day, he might never have been born and millions of deaths would have been averted.

Of course, many subscribe to the notion of fate and how it’s all meant to be, though I don’t personally. I think life is just chaos and stuff just happens. There’s no preordained structure.

The weirdest realisation I have ever had was that some people really are that stupid.

[quote Zilla1]@EvilPea

regarding people types, I find it odd. Put a group or French, German and Scottish people separately in three rooms and they will tend to be recognisably similar to each other. Put the business people from all the countries in one room, the union officials in another and the farmers in the third and they will all be recognisably similar.[/quote]
It’s odd isn’t it. The same people replicated over and over. Despite different life experiences, languages etc. the same people over and over.
Like cut and paste.

Was on Facebook the other day (I know... and saw some memes that made me realise that obeying the law is not always good, or "the right thing to do". (Anne Frank meme in particular)

But then also realised that, to be honest, I tend to run with the herd and would probably follow the rules passed down anyhow. What rules have I mindlessly followed that have hurt others?

Absolutely loving this thread, some of these are really messing with my mind. Top tip: don’t read just before bed!!

I’ve read to page 20 so thought I’d add my musings before I jump back in…

• every time I’m on a plane where the journey is 3hrs or less I always think that someone could be running a marathon and I’d be in another country and they would still be running.

• languages baffle my head and the names of things which are just made up - e.g. why is it a stegosaurus or a sofa or a bannister etc?

• the majority of things I do I have been taught how to do e.g. go to the toilet, wash face, make food, work, speak, write, pay bills - there was a time when I didn’t know how to do all these.

• when I’m travelling at night and I see others travelling I wonder, why are they out so late? Where are they going? I for some reason become more curious in the evening

• knowing I’m not going to do all the things I want to in life (read all the books, watch the films, visit the places) yet I still repeat some of the things I’ve done

It always amazes me just how much landscapes have changed.

I live near a cathedral city & I love the driver bright the countryside and being the first in the car to spot the spire coming out of the distance. I'm not religious but I love history and architecture. I always imagine how it must have felt to people walking /riding to the city to see such a sight loom in the distance. Whereas today the cathedral has to compete with other building and the changes landscape it must have been awe inspiring to see the tallest building like a cathedral for the first time.

For me it's just how vulnerable we all really are. My brain still can't comprehend when I see the footage of those planes going into the twin towers, no matter how many times I've seen it over the years. There's just no predicting or avoiding danger if it's going to happen. I think it's this realisation that's responsible for my live every moment so it matters, and you only truly regret the things you don't try mantra.

@whatkatiedidnext31

It took until I was 43 to actually comprehend that America and Russia are basically next to each other. We only ever look at a map of the world online or in an atlas with America on the left, Africa middle and Russia on the right/top. Didn’t even think that as we are an actual globe, they would be next to each other….I literally had to sit down, and I think I’m a fairly intelligent person! (Or maybe not!!!)

Did you know that Alaska used to belong to Russia and was sold to the US?

When something bad happens to you, it's just your world that gets turned upside down. Everyone else keeps living their normal life like nothing happened.

@chisanunian that is exactly what I was going to say! I get that some people aren't all that bright, and some people haven't had the benefit of a good education, but for instance - I hadn't realised that there are perfectly ordinary people out there who still have no idea, say, about basic nutrition! There is so much information on the telly, in magazines, on the internet that it should be impossible not to have picked up the basics - but they still don't know!

I have learned that even though I still feel like I'm 26 everyone sees me as the 55 year old woman that I am, and treats me accordingly.
A few of my friends have died recently too, so I am very aware that good health is a blessing, and that I have taken it for granted for far too long.
I wish I had put more money into my pension, and not wasted money on so much crap. I spent £500 on my wedding dress twenty years ago, and wore it once. Still can't believe I did that.

These aren't weird realisations really, am sure many people have had them, but I can't believe I didn't spend my youth in a more worthwhile way, carving out a career, saving hard and looking after my health. Instead i just bought loads of crap, drank too much and did a job I enjoyed but didn't pay well.

I realise now that my earlier post was a bit off topic - - but i have now read the thread and have two more.
One thing that blows my mind, is that we know more about the universe than we do about our oceans.
Another is that when I had my newborn DD I realised that most of the other women I saw in the street had all felt the same way.
I was also quite old when realised I wasn't going to grow up to look like the women in the fashion magazines - it was very cruel

@AllisoninWunderland I feel the same and (reluctantly and against better judgement) have my DD7 in mainstream school.

I am by no means anti-establishment. I think the education system is victorian and has little place in modern society. It does not create rounded human beings.

I am giving DD7 one more year and my DD5 reception year to decide if we stay in the system.

@CatWoman12345

I often wonder what life changing invention we are missing because the inventor was killed before their time.

Water powered cars is the answer to this one

@DontStopMeNow7

Yeah that makes sense. I suppose I’m surprised that accents still endure. Is it an age thing: my parents moved to Somerset so I was born there but we left when I was 3; however I literally had a Somerset accent for years (very weird because I was the only one in the family to talk like that!)

Also, in bigger countries like the US, don’t you have to go a lot further for the accent to change? Or…?

You'd be amazed at how different our accents have become in the last 100 years. I'm from Yorkshire very clearly by my accent. But it's actually not so different from my London partner except the flat vowels and verbiage.

My grandad or great grandad? Not a chance in hell my partner would've understood them.

I love this thread, I've read it all!

Mine is; the other day I drove down a high street I'd never been in before. And I had this weird moment realising there were hundreds of similar high streets in similar towns with similar people walking around doing similar things in similar shops

I sometimes think about design "faults" in animals eg how come a tiny ant gets 6 legs and can walk and carry a leaf at the same time, but something huge like an ostrich has to make do with just two legs and a beak? Why don't birds have "arms"? They have two modes of transport - legs and wings - but no way of really holding something. LOL.