I am so annoyed with myself. I left the glass on the edge of my desk, because there wasn't anywhere else to put it in easy reach, and then I knocked it off when I got up. It fell onto some other crocks and broke, leaving minute shards of glass all over the rug, that I had to stoop and pick up by hand, since I couldn't wake the baby with the hoover.

I haven't broken anything through carelessness since I was a small child. (Well, there was one occasion when I was about thirteen, when I rolled off the sofa to escape my father, who was tickling me, and landed squarely on my youngest sister's precious plate - I'm not sure she's forgiven me yet!) Even then, I rarely knocked over or dropped anything. I could probably count the number of times that I did on one hand.

It's not clear to me whether it's a question of personality or of peculiar nervous system (though admittedly the two are so intertwined that it's hard to distinguish between them), but I have always done everything carefully, which makes me very slow at most things I do. Slow enough to make people angry with me, quite often! I have quite often been called lazy, but only by people who don't notice the perfectionism in my work. People who go fast don't always realise the value in going slow, because they aren't necessarily aware of the things that would change if they did.

A couple of examples spring to mind. My best friend always does everything fast, and therefore less carefully than I do. She was expressing irritation at having broken a milk bottle recently, and I was surprised because she'd broken a milk bottle only a few weeks ago, which seemed statistically odd to me. I said that I hadn't broken a milk bottle since I was a child and she was gobsmacked - that seemed statistically odd to her! But I would rather go slowly and not have the anguish and mess of a breakage, whereas she would rather go fast and hopefully avoid wasting time on something as dull as getting breakfast.

The second example concerns the same friend. While watching me change a nappy, she commented that she prefers the packs of wipes that have the lid on top, while I was using the kind that just have a thin plastic seal. I said I found the lids bulky and unnecessary. She said that she found, without them, the wipes dried out and the packs were liable to come apart. This surprised me, because I had simply never found it to be the case. That surprised her, because she always finds it to be the case. I said I found that if you were careful in sealing the pack, the wipes stay moist, and she said that she just couldn't be bothered with that. She remarked that she thought the whole thing was probably simply because I spend so long changing a nappy, where she likes to just get it done and out the way. I think that she would save herself a lot of money and irritation if she took a second or two longer to put things away properly so they stay fresh, and she also wouldn't have the battle she does now with her one year old to get her to stay still for nappy changes if she had taken the time to make it a happy interaction with her when she was a baby, instead of an irritation to escape from. I see every nappy change as an investment in my relationship with my baby, an opportunity to play and talk, help him to feel comfortable with his body and teach him for when he's a toddler that getting dressed is something pleasant to do with a parent, not something to complain about and escape from!

The wipes are a characteristic example for my friend, who also always leaves food out while dashing off to the next thing and therefore always has to throw out food that's gone off, even though she worries about money. The funny thing is, she thinks she's very particular about putting food away, because she's the one in her family who gets annoyed when it's gone off because it hasn't been put away! My habit is to put away any food item the moment I've finished using it, even before I eat whatever I've prepared. It makes a big difference to how long the food lasts.

So I think that being fast can be costly in the long run, while being slow is costly in the present. I guess it's a question of what's more important to you as an individual. Although, having said that, I couldn't change to being a fast person if I tried. It would work against my nature. I need a long time to consider, to plan the best course of action and then to enact it as perfectly as I can. Impetuosity drives me up the wall because it causes so many problems and creates so much waste (of time, energy, money and other resources).

Ingrained in me from my childhood are the things my mother taught us: if you don't drop crumbs, you won't have to sweep; if you wipe that up now, it'll come off easily; put the glass in the middle of the table to remove the risk of knocking it. *sigh*

Breaking a glass is even more annoying if you're someone who normally has bare feet. And if you're someone who has a great deal of mugs but only four glasses. Plus, having grown up poor, it hurts the miser in me to think I'll have to replace it or do without because of my own folly. It may seem silly to think so much about a broken glass - especially if you're someone who breaks things all the time - but I'm very annoyed with myself.