tagged...

The Rules:

Once you’ve been tagged, you have to write a blog with 10 weird, random, facts, habits or goals about yourself. At the end, choose 6 people to be tagged, list their names & why you tagged them. Don’t forget to leave them a comment saying “You’re it!” & to go read your blog. You cannot tag the person that tagged you, so since you’re not allowed to tag me back; let me know when you are done so I can go read YOUR weird/random/odd facts, habits and goals.

*-----*

Okay, so here we go!

1. When I was in kindergarten I got put in the corner for shushing Karla, the rather portent girl with curly piggytails who was talking when Mrs. S had specifically told us to be quiet. Hey, I was just enforcing the rules. But no, I was stuck right in that corner with Karla and have never, ever been so ashamed in my entire life. And I never, ever acted out of line in class ever, ever again because of it.

2. I have fantasized about fingerpainting with chocolate Jell-O pudding since the last time I did that--in Kindergarten. Nothing kinky--just fingerpainting, then being able to LICK MY FINGERS CLEAN when I was done.

3. I once ran to my first grade teacher and reported that "The boys have been playing in the girls' bathroom again." "Why, how do you know that?" she asked. In my 6-year old worldly wisdom, I rolled my eyes and responded, "Well, all the toilet seats are up again."

4. I stayed after school every day for two months to teach my sixth grade math teacher how to play cribbage. She still remembers that. (told you I'm a nerd...)

5. When I imbibe, I instinctively want to dance. Always. It is so incredibly hard for me to sit at a bar or even just have a glass of wine at someone's house and to have to quench my intense desire to dance. I therefore taught a lot of non-dancing Japanese to dance in my three years there. What can I say...I left my mark.

6. I honestly thought I could become vegetarian until I learned that I was allergic to soy...even with my history of anemia. I was almost there. Even though I am not vegetarian, however, my mindset in how I eat meat has changed considerably in the past 10 years, by respecting as much of the entire animal that gave its life to feed me and my family by using as much of it as I can, and by making better and healthier (especially for me) meat-purchasing decisions--you wouldn't believe the soy in deli meat, or in feed given to mass-produced meat. I have to watch out for all those variables now--which is a good thing. I have had to be forced to become more conscious about what and how I eat.

7. I think I am part pyromaniac. I could stare at a fire or a flame for hours on end, creating images in my mind, watching the flame(s) dance and admiring the grace of this living yet non-living element. I love fire. I love the heat with which fire fills my soul. I love to watch it dance. I have since I was very, very young and would sit in front of the fireplace on Sunday nights after bathtime in my pink homemade bathrobe and let my hair dry to the heat of the fire. I would sit there and stare at the flames. Once my father threw a clipboard in the fireplace in an effort to get rid of some things. That made the fire turn lots of pretty colors...but sparks flew out the chimney onto the roof and Dad ended up outside hosing down the roof so our house wouldn't go up in flames. Not his smoothest move--but a great memory.

8. I have only been awakened with an orgasm once in my life, by a beautiful man I was blessed to have in my life for a short time while living in Japan. We had a lovely friendship that, in our third year of knowing each other, turned into something more. He had a passion for Latin culture and was learning Spanish and how to dance. He loved to travel. He was a climber. We laughed--wow, how we laughed when we were together. His eyes always laughed. He loved Life and loved even more to experience Life with such passion that his family in small-town rural Japan just could not understand him. I was so young--but I will never forget that morning and often find myself wondering, "What if...?" What if I had followed this free spirit of his? What if I had (DARED) gone against the grain of parental expectation? What if I had not told him to stop contacting me because I had met who is my current husband? Would he have come for me as he was planning to? What if I had followed his passion and started climbing, too? Would I have conquered K2 by now as well? Would I be any happier in my personal life? Where would we be?

9. On the day of my university graduation, following the ceremony I was in the courtyard with my family and my boyfriend's mother. I had just been given a gift and had my hands full of stuff--degree certificate, cap, gifts, camera, the works--and nobody was offering to help me at all. Something happened-I am not sure what, as I also had horrible cramps that day and wasn't completely aware of my surroundings-but my camera ended up in a bucket of water. I had just graduated magna cum laude, with honors and double major-double double-minor all in 4 years from my university, and my parents shot me the most disapppointed look I have ever received from anybody in my life--all because plop! went my camera when I was just too overwhelmed with crap to be able to handle it all. They instead criticized me for not having the wrist strap on. My boyfriend's mother later confided that she then, at that moment, understood all I had told her about my relationship with my family--all summed up in one single communal look. It was as if everything I had just done, all I had just earned and the positive recognition back to my family did not mean diddly-squat. It all came down to the fact that I am just a frickin' clutz and that I could never, not even on my graduation day, do anything right in their eyes.

10. I rehearse what I should have said in various situations, or what I should say if certain occasions should arise, when I am alone. In my house, in my garden, in my mirror--wherever. I always talk to myself and sometimes think I live too much in the Land of What-If.

So, now that you think I am totally nuts-o, I hereby tag:

Z--I need that confirmation that you are, indeed, as quirky as I am!
She-Ra--dahling, you can't be as normal as you always appear!
Windy--I just like to have fun with you!
Brad--I imagine you would have fun with this, plus you are a great meme responder.
Val--if you have time, I don't want to impose!

...um, that's all I can come up with.