Shiitake on Gossip

On the way to school this morning, my daughter and I were discussing one of her classes that bores her to tears. She said, “You know, Mom, I just don’t give a shiitake mushroom about it.” That got us into a fit of giggling. I think that captures the Monday morning sentiment for most of us. My husband wondered aloud this morning, “I wonder how many people consider Monday their favorite day of the week.” We all agreed that these people would have to be very rare birds. (or mushrooms)

As you know, I am not above perusing gossip columns. (at least I own it) I check out Perez Hilton, radaronline, TMZ, etc. once in a blue moon, or if I am honest, once in a moon of any shape, size or color. I look at these websites to stay light and bemused (and probably to scoff in a tone of superiority – “Why are these people so famous? This is ridiculous” and then I say to myself, “Well, it could be because even middle-aged people like you, who can’t put a name to most of these young celebrities, read these stupid columns for ?!fun?!”). I, of course, go into my reading of the gossip, with a cynical mindset. My shadow side likes to read the Comments to the gossip the best, for the snarky, witty amusements. I, of course, never expect to glean any wise insights from these Comments which more often than not, take any stupid Hollywood gossip straight to the dark, divided road of political and racial issues. So, anyway, imagine my surprise when I actually found the need to write a Comment to a gossip story down in my special, precious wisdom notebook, to ponder myself, and to share with you, my friends and readers.

The story in question which I was perusing this weekend, was gossip about Justin Bieber’s and Hailey Baldwin’s upcoming nuptials. Now I, like a lot of the world, thought that these two were already married, but honestly, I don’t care enough to find out the true backstory. (as if finding out a true story about anything is actually even possible these days – it’s funny to me, that at a day and age of information onslaught, when nothing is seemingly secret or sacred, we know less truth about anything than ever before, but that’s for another blog) The Comments section about this Buzzfeed story, was abuzz with wiseacres putting bets on to whether this relationship would last more than two years. Some romantics really like these two celebrities, and were hoping that the Baldwin/Bieber marriage would last “forever.” Here’s where the wisdom popped out of the Comments section, like a huge gold nugget, in a gold pan otherwise filled with useless silt (or shiitakes gone bad). It was written by the sage user named “violinfemmes” (no “t” on purpose, I guess) Violinfemmes wrote:

“A word to the wise: When you focus on forever, you forget about now, and in a marriage, when you forget about now, you lose your chance at forever.”

Damn. I should ask violinfemmes to be my guest blogger. I believe that this astutely written wisdom, applies not only just to marriage, but to life in general. Damn. Do you know what I took from this experience? I am proud that I take the time to read the gossip. It is like panning for gold, and deeply challenging panning, at that. You know, in the end, I guess that I give a shiitake mushroom about what’s happening in this crazy world around us. Shiitake can be very appetizing and satisfying to devour. Frankly, I’ve always been the weirdo who loves mushrooms.