Remember those universes I was talking about recently? Universe, or U, is how some math systems define the bounds in which you can perform your calculations, manipulations, translations, transformations, and any other action. It is the closed system where no work is done without displacement. In order to work in U, one must recognize and accept the boundaries in U. The benefit of accepting those boundaries is I can set up systems and it will lead to – the predictable¹You know the end of the extremes. And I still like to predict things..

I, when writing these missives, try to give you enough information so you understand the U I am writing about and from. I make hints to Venn diagrams²Where the universe is the rectangle.. I talk about projections and us each having our own universes with their own rules and boundaries.

And I told you, quite boldly, I spend a lot of time observing how your universe is different from mine. 

Do you do the same?

Last time³https://lettersforzerrius.com/2022/11/02/a-funny-thing-happened-on-the-way-to-a-career-change/, I announced that I had gotten a promotion. What I thought I communicated was this promotion was a major life change as well as a career change. What I thought I said was just like when I made a decision about my life and the direction it would go, something unexpected had already occurred and the decision I had made in the future⁴In all three cases the following March. would no longer be an option for me. And, the important part, was, that I was already getting what I wanted even though I felt like I had lost agency in obtaining what I wanted⁵I’m complicated.,⁶Please note that I am for a woman’s right to choose and of course I could have rejected the way life had changed. I get that. But that wasn’t part of my design space for BigOne, LittleOne or this new adventure.

When I got the feedback that half of the people who read this humble set of letters meant for Zerrius but shared with the world⁷4 people thought I was announcing Husband and I were expecting our third child⁸Hey! I got an incredible promotion that changes my life, my salary, my agency on the work place. And yeah. A great new title too., I was dumbfounded. 

I have no problem admitting that me being pregnant, now or in the future, is not possible. My interior universe, from where I write these letters, are written in the realm of the possible in my mind. Pregnancy is not possible. So I didn’t clarify the major life change, like others in the past, wasn’t another pregnancy.

One of the traits about myself that I embrace is that I am a big out of the box thinker. I tend to push people around me to think outside the box and question the boundaries of their own universe, just like I push the boundaries in mine. It is a common theme throughout my life. Grades not good enough to get into graduate school? Take more classes and raise your GPA. Not happy with my graduate degree program? Go back and get another bachelor’s degree⁹That was a huge outside the box thought when I did it in 1997.. It wasn’t in the realm of the possible for the expectations for a career in the 90s, but it was in mine. So, I did it.

This is also a theme in my parenting philosophy. It isn’t that anything is possible, because I know that is usually not true. But, a lot more is possible than you think it is. When BigOne was considering going to university, they told Husband and I they were not sure they could last four years in college. I told them, “Commit to one semester at a time.” Sometimes, expanding what is possible in your U is accepting that you don’t have to define anything in other people’s terms. Look at life in the increments that make sense for you, BigOne. 

Back to the matter of the pregnancy I didn’t announce and isn’t happening¹⁰Because it is not possible, my reaction went through several stages.

First, I was outraged and ashamed that my writing wasn’t clear.

Then, as is my wont, I tried to figure out how my writing implied that I was having a third child.

Looking on the bright side, I moved on to, “Wow! People think I could get pregnant! How nice!”

And finally, what in the writing implied I was pregnant? We rarely go to the simplest explanation for miscommunication. But the simplest answer is I didn’t think I needed to correct a misconception because the misconception did not occur to me¹¹Misconception. Not missed conception. Pun Intentional. If you lived in my U, you would understand that wasn’t a possibility.

I asked other readers of my blog if THEY understood I wasn’t announcing a new life bring brought into the world, I was disappointed 25% of the reader base said, “Yeah, I wondered that too.” Only 25%, and this includes Husband, knew that it was so outside the realm of the possible, that assumption made no sense.

And so I have learned a couple of things about what makes one missive better than another in the past month¹²Apparently, the examples make it better, even if I am tweaking the retelling of the experience to fit the point I am making. Added to the list: read it one more time trying to see if someone else’s realm of the possible would make the words mean something entirely different. Dare I say – transform my impossible into a possibility.