Eight in attendance Pat had three votes but Rosemary had four with Sue One.
Below is Rosemary's amusing take on knowing what no is not.
"NO/KNOW"
How do we know that we know what we mean when we say
NO?
How do others know that we know what we mean when we say NO?
And how
do WE know that others know what THEY mean when they say NO?
NO can be known
as so many different things to many different people, so how can we know when NO
means NO and how can we know when NO doesn't quite mean NO?
We might say
NO to a toddler who reaches out to an open fireplace or an angry-looking dog or
cat, because WE know it could be dangerous, but how does the toddler know that
we know why we've said NO when they don't know the reasoning behind our
NO?
When we become teenagers and begin to know what first love is all
about, we don't know how to handle this overwhelming new emotion, so we
emphatically know we should say NO, while all the time we know we want to say
YES. But because we know we ought to say NO, we say NO in a half-hearted
way.
And when we become parents ourselves we KNOW when to say NO to our
own children, don't we? Yet who knows whether, in a few years' time, saying NO
to our children will be known as a sort of politically incorrect HATE CRIME,
because saying NO to them will be somehow damaging to their own sense of
independence and individuality - even when we know that saying NO is what they
need to know to keep them safe. I believe that some high-ranking
educationalists already claim to know that it's wrong and demeaning to ever say
NO to their pupils, for teachers no longer know best. So when children know
what they want to do, they should be allowed to do it, even if they know it's
wrong - because no-one is allowed to say NO to them, so no-one HAS said
NO.
When I was a child my parents very rarely said NO to me. That
doesn't mean I was a spoilt brat! NO, for whenever an occasion arose when they
knew they should either say YES or NO, instead they always said, "WE'LL SEE".
Well, "WE'LL SEE" was no answer to me, so I used to get really fed up, because I
knew that "WE'LL SEE" could mean either YES or NO! So when I asked could I go
out after tea to play with Ann? WE'LL SEE! Could I please have a penny for
sweets? WE'LL SEE! And the year when I knew that all I wanted for Christmas
was a doll like Linda's, even if it meant all the family helping to pay for it,
and it was the only present I had? WE'LL SEE!
WE'LL SEE - and I just
knew it would be NO to that doll - but it wasn't, and I still have that somewhat
bedraggled china doll - no hair, no fancy dress and eyes a bit wonky! Yes, that
time my parents' WE'LL SEE turned out to be a YES, not the NO I'd
expected.
So, how do we know when NO means NO? Or how do we know that we
are really 'in the know' about something important which we know that no-one
else knows? I don't KNOW - do you?
