Don’t Saw Sawdust – The Best Advice I Ever Got

Daily writing prompt

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received?

Grandma’s One-Liner

“Don’t try to saw sawdust.”
That was my grandmother’s mic drop. No lecture, no sugarcoating—just one image sharp enough to shut down my spirals.

The Kitchen Scene

She usually dropped it at the kitchen table, where the smell of over-brewed black tea clung to the walls. The kind so strong it could take the enamel off your teeth. She’d sit across from me with that sly smirk, nudging a plate of her “cookies” toward me. Not cookies at all—plain crackers she baked every single day, cracked edges, flaky crunch, tasting of nothing. Blank. But I never cared. Because it wasn’t the cracker I loved—it was her company. Her smirk. The ritual.

Why It Stuck

I’d be rambling about a failed test, some petty fight, or later, a travel screw-up. She’d let me go just long enough, sip her tea, and then—boom. “Don’t saw sawdust.” Delivered with a flick of the wrist, like brushing crumbs from the table.

And I listened. I never became the type to stew for days. Ten, maybe fifteen minutes tops of replaying comebacks in my head, then I drop it. Because sawdust isn’t wood—you can’t glue it back together or carve it into anything useful. You sweep it up and move on.

Travel Proof

Same rule on the road. The sweaty “local bus” in Bangkok where I cooked alive in my own clothes? Sawdust. The scam taxi in Hanoi with the “special tourist price”? Sawdust. Annoying in the moment, sure, but not worth sawing twice.