“We do what we do, because of who we are. If we did otherwise, we would not be ourselves.” Neil Gaiman
Because I'm a teacher and a writer, I observe and wonder about many things. Today as I worked in my garden, my thoughts turned to an old story, then to my own actions.
One of the stories that has been passed around concerns a "reason why something is done", rather like a tradition, but smaller. A family member asked a mom in the family why she always took the bone out of the Sunday roast? She answered, because my mother did. They found her mother and asked the same question. She didn't know either, just did it after watching her own mother prepare the roast. Luckily 'her' mother still lived, so was asked that question. She looked up and said: "I didn't have a pan big enough for a big roast so had to remove the bone so it would fit."
I thought of this story today and began to think about certain things I do, "just because", or perhaps they come from years of growing up with watching others live their lives. Some I understand; some are mysteries.