Never Shake Hands with a Great Horned Owl

We all know things. Some of us suspect more than we know. The latter group consists mainly of brothers-in-law.

During my school years – grade school, junior high and high school – I spent a lot of time seated in a school bus. The ride to school took about three minutes. The ride home from school took three hours on a good day. On those trips home, the bus pulled up at the end of our driveway, and the school bus door made a loud hissing sound as compressed air was released from the pneumatic system operating the door.

I stepped off the bus and looked back at the bus driver’s giant smile. He was happy to be done with another one for another day. I began walking and strolled past the dairy barn where my father had started preparations for the second milking of the day. I made a right-hand turn uphill, skipping past the pump house and the towering windmill attached to its roof. Then it was a sweet saunter to the house. A fence with a substantial wooden gate surrounded the yard to protect lilacs and peonies from critters that might harm them. I never counted my steps on the sidewalk to the front door, which led into a room meant for dumping dirty shoes and fragrant outerwear. The next door took me into the kitchen filled with enticing smells and my mother’s smiles. Mom was washing dishes. She did that 23 hours a day. Each day, she greeted me lovingly before asking, “What did you learn in school today?”

Thanks to the long bus ride home, I had time to think of something I’d learned and had an answer most days, but there were a few days when I was stumped. I got the hint and realized ceaseless learning was necessary.

Some seekers scale tall mountains to ask a bearded guru with legs crossed in a permanent cramp, what the meaning of life is. I haven’t done that, but I’ve learned things. Here are some of them.

If you’re an adult, nobody cares if your socks don’t match.

No matter what, you should eat something.

Hamburgers taste the best when they’re surrounded by a small-town cafe.

Mansplaining isn’t a good thing. Don’t make me have to tell you why.

If Mama ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy. That’s ancient wisdom that has stood the test of time

There are never lines to the bathroom at a waterpark.

What I used to do without thinking, I now think without doing.

Thanks to leaky brains, life is made of moments we don’t remember.

I led bus tours for years and learned that stopping at bathrooms was the most vital part of a trip.

I was in the breakfast food aisle of a grocery store, checking cereal numbers, when a friend told me about a recent oil change to his chariot. He worried because there was no next-oil-change-due reminder sticker placed on the inside of his windshield. “Are they going out of business?” he wondered. “Don’t they want my business?” “Did they even change the oil?” And that’s how rumors start.

The luckiest number is 143,916.78. That’s the reason I’ve never won a lottery.

Putting up a plastic flamingo doesn’t qualify a lawn as a wildlife sanctuary. Seeing it fly away might.

Gloves are a handy invention.

No one has ever been in an empty room.

A good sledgehammer may be the last tool you’ll ever need.

I had the hiccups for three weeks after surgery. There are 8.2 billion people in the world, but I’m the one who found a cure. Keep saying “pineapple” until they go away. It works, but it takes three weeks.

In a geology class, I learned that the most common rock in the world is a leaverite. If you see one, you leave ‘er right where it is.

No carpenter ants ever become plumbers.

If you don’t like the way your lawn looks, cover it with disabled lawnmowers as an excuse

Never shake hands with a great horned owl. The grip strength in those feet – 200 to 500 pounds per square inch – can be up to 10 times stronger than the grip of a human hand.

And I’ve learned they aren’t making yardsticks any longer.