Our fridge is covered with photos, cartoons, random greeting cards, fortune cookie wisdom, and TONS of magnetic poetry. The majority of our magnetic poetry is from the Shakespeare version, and is full of funny and truly poetic words like thee and thine.
Ever since high school, when I found this particular set and installed it in my locker, it has been a source of amusement for many of my friends. (I actually used come back to my locker and find new phrases from my friends who had broken in to compose their silly lofty thoughts.) Even now when our friends come over for dinner, they have a great time playing with all the itty bitty words on the fridge.
My favorite phrase, however has been in a corner of the fridge for a long while now, and came from a tiny set of magnetic poetry included in a sample mailing of a some beauty product. (I still don't know why on earth they thought sending me magnets would be a good marketing idea, but that's their problem not mine.)
It says: "I am me and like Mom"
I know so many of us grow up taking mental notes of the things we want to avoid imitating in our parents - a personality trait, a habit, some phrase or gesture, etc. That is, after all, the natural way we learn and grow. I think the counterpart to that is equally important though - those things we should learn and adopt from our parents.
I think that this little phrase captures both sides of the coin. I am me - my own unique person with my own sets of likes/dislikes, personality traits, habits, and decisions. And yet I am like Mom - in so many ways I imitate and copy the woman who I have admired and learned from for all these years.
Who knew that a little magnetic poetry could be so good?
