Somebody asked about things people misunderstood until way too far into adulthood – 23 grown-ups who should have known better

There are some things in life we learn because we are explicitly taught, such as how to do long division or ride a bike, but there are other things that we are expected to pick up through osmosis and, it turns out, we often don’t. And the strange things we end up thinking as adults as consequently rather funny.

Over on the CasualUK subreddit user AlternativeAd1984 posted this:

‘What did you think was something else until shockingly late?’

And they had an example to get everyone going.

‘I only discovered about a year ago that ‘Daylight Savings’ was the clocks changing. I never really thought about what it meant before but I assumed it was something to do with the banks.’

And the replies from until-very-recently clueless people were equally as comical, like these…

1.

‘My sister thought ‘primadonna’ meant music before Madonna. I still bring it up now years later.’
–ray-chill123

2.

‘The village of Rattery. There are signs for it on the A38 in Devon that just say RATTERY. Never been. But there are often also occasional signs on the roads for a ‘Cattery’ (aka, a kennel for cats).

‘You can guess what I thought Rattery was. Discovered the truth in my 30s.’
–BrightwaterBard

3.

‘Quite embarrassed by this one but up until a few months ago (I’m 50) I never thought about where the light came from when the moon shone, my hubby pointed out it’s the sun shining on it. Have I gone though my life thinking the moon shines? I must have done.’
–PoodleTedmum

4.

‘Until relatively recently I thought the phrase “having a ‘mare” (meaning having a really bad time of it) referred to the idea of owning a female horse in a challenging circumstance (rather than mare being shorthand for nightmare).

‘For example if work was going bad and I was having a mare, it was like saying imagine how bad this would be if I was trying to contain a horse in the office right now. I am in my 40s.’
–PenGlassMug

5.

‘The opening song of Only Fools And Horses. For some reason, for most of my 50 years of my life I interpreted the line ‘Why do only fools and horses work?’ to mean ‘Why do fools and horses together function correctly, whereas no other combination does?’ rather than ‘Why do only fools, and horses, labour?’.’
–NotoriousREV

6.

‘I thought a narwhal was a mythical creature, like a sea unicorn or something. I was 40 when I found out they’re real.’
–Mammoth_logfarm

7.

‘I was older than I should be before I discovered that ‘Elay’ and Los Angeles were the same place.’
–mostly_kittens

8.

‘Growing up, I called them Chester Drawers, thinking they originated from Chester. In my 30’s I found out they’re actually, a Chest of Drawers. I still prefer Chester Drawers though.’
–BartholomewKnightIII

9.

‘As a child, I thought tourists and terrorists were the same word. I got scared in the summer: I grew up in a holiday town.’
–Modokon

10.

‘The school I used to work at had links with a charity that would take a few kids to Lourdes every year. My TA (who to be fair, was Muslim and had no reason to know about Lourdes) thought for years that they were taking the kids to watch cricket.’
–GoldFreezer

11.

‘Up until about the age of 28, I thought Easter eggs represented the boulder in front of Jesus’s tomb. Then we’re all like yes, smash that boulder, Jesus is free.’
–cjbannister

12.

‘I was in duty free trying perfumes last year, and realised that my grandma’s ‘natural’ smell is actually Chanel No 5. I had always categorised that smell in my head as ‘grandma’. I am 33 .’
–Celtic_Cheetah_92