The old me

The topic for this week is to discuss what we were like as kids.  What was I like as a child?

I was a pretty opinionated little girl, who liked mustard sandwiches on sourdough bread.  I think it had to do with the fact that my mother bought cotto salami and made us sandwiches out of that.  It wasn't the good salami.  It was the nasty kind with green bits of something in it.  I would always take the meat out and just eat the bread and mustard.  Eventually I asked her to stop putting the meat in.  I think if we had yummy lunch meat I might have felt differently about it.

I had big plans for the for the future.  My cousin and I were going to be super rich and buy Hearst Castle.  She was going to be a big psychologist and I was going to be the president of IBM.   She did become a social worker and I did work in business, but neither of us has ever become so wealthy we could buy Hearst Castle off the state of California.  But here is the thing, I don't want to own a house that big.  I mean seriously, what would you do with a house that big?  The house I have now is too big for me to keep up with... and yes, I realize you have servants in a big house like that, but it seems like a waste of resources to me now.

Self-starter and entrepreneurial are words you would use to describe me.  When I was about 8 years old, I drew a bunch of pictures and went door to door trying to sell them.  After knocking on the doors of about 3 houses, my mother comes flying down the street in her house coat.  She was yelling my name, like I was doing something wrong.  I stop, turn and look at her.  As she is running wildly down the street with no shoes.  She grabs my arm and walks me home.  I was told not to go door to door.  It was many, many years before I figured out how she even knew what I was doing.  I never did find out who called her and told her what I was up to.

These things all make me realize, I am not really that much different now than I was then.  Sure, I don't go door to door trying to sell my knitted creations to my neighbors, but if one of them wanted one, I probably would sell it!

Want to see how the other ladies have grown?  Check them out at: Froggie, Momarock, and Merrylandgirl.

Driving along... crash

This week's topic is about learning to drive. 

My mom taught me to drive.  She taught everyone to drive.  When she was a teenager she taught all her friends to drive.  My father was too uptight to teach us. 

We loaded up into the 1970-something Ford LTD station wagon, (my Dad totaled that car, but that is a story for another day) complete with wood paneling and my mother drove me over to a new subdivision.  The roads where in, but the houses weren't.  I cruised around the subdivision a few times and then I hit the open roads.  I drove us home.

In the state of California, you were required to take drivers training.  The schools offered it, but my mom wanted me to take typing so I couldn't take it at school.  As a result the drivers training I received was from a private company.  I spent my required hours behind the wheel with some middle aged man.  I'm not really sure what possesses people to teach drivers training.  It was fairly uneventful.

I turned 16, got my license and was so excited!  My mother had just gotten a new car.  A Volvo station wagon.  She was pretty happy about this new fancy car.  I begged and begged her to let me drive it.  I don't remember where I was going, but I was on Hollister Avenue and a flat bed truck stopped suddenly in front of me.  I swerved to avoid rear ending it, and I side swiped my mom's new car. 

I didn't even get the drivers name and number.  I drove home in a panic.  My mother was furious.  The pin striping on the car never matched.  She said it was there to remind me what I did to her new car.  I had to make dinner every night for 6 months to pay off the deductible.

We don't talk about this much now, but I will never forget that feeling in my stomach when I saw what happened to my mother's new car.  Amazingly, she let me drive it again.  

I never crashed it again.  The next time that car was in an accident was when my brother was backing it out of the garage and smashed into my Dad's car.  He pulled forward and tried again, and proceeded to smash into his car which was parked on the other side of the driveway.  I was thankful my car was on the street that day!

Want to see how the other ladies did behind the wheel?  Check them out at: Froggie, Momarock, and Merrylandgirl.

Wisp

This week's topic is to discuss something you always romanticize.  I will admit something to you all, I usually don't read the other posts until AFTER I post mine.  I cheated this week.  Now, I think my post might not really answer the question, but here we go:

I romanticize being thin.  I have never ever been thin.  Never ever.  There were times in my life that I was less fat than I am now, but I was never thin.  I have visions of being able to tuck my t-shirt into my jeans and wear a wide belt and have that actually look ok.  No muffin top.

The thin (and by extension pretty) girls seem to have it all.  Life is just handed to them on a silver platter.  The fat (and by extension ugly) girls have to work so much harder for everything.  Thin girls find boyfriends, husbands, jobs, everything much more easily than fat girls. 

I remember hearing, always go home with a fat chick at the end of the night, they are so grateful that they try harder in bed.  See, fat girls have to work harder. 

How many men say, I want to date a fat girl?  Not many.  Given the choice, most men choose the thinnest woman that they can.  You don't see rich powerful men with fat girls do you? 

Given the choice between two closely qualified job candidates, the thin girl will always get the job over the fat girl.  Even if the thin girl is slightly less qualified than the fat one.  It makes it just that much harder.

When I was a little girl, my mother told me thin girls can wear anything.  They can go to K-mart and pick up an outfit and look cute.  Fat girls have to make sure that what they pick looks ok, and often have to spend more money to look just ok. 

I am sure that this isn't really the case.  When I was in college I asked a bunch of my thin friends what it was like to be able to wear anything.  To a person they told me that they couldn't.  That some things didn't look right on them. 

Many of my skinny friends are divorced, unemployed or struggling with a myriad of problems, similar to or worse than mine.  But  it sure seems like it would be easier to be thin.

What do the other ladies see with rose colored glasses?  Check them out at: Froggie, Momarock, and Merrylandgirl.

What would you save?

This week we are talking about evacuating.  The question is:

In light of all the fires and other natural disasters, if you had to evacuate you home, what would you take with you and why? If your home was destroyed what would you miss most?

I grew up in fire country.  We had a grab and go bag in our closet for most of my childhood.  The grab and go bad contained current copies of important documents.  Because you never knew when you were going to have to leave immediately.

About 10 or 15 years ago a fire ripped through Oakland.  People were not evacuated in a timely manner and there was a fairly significant loss of life.  This changed the way fires that were located near populated areas were fought.  In the past evacuations were done in a much more immediate way.  Now, people are often given a warning and some time to get out.  More people are evacuated than are probably in harms way.  This creates easy access for the firefighters, but it also prevents what happened Oakland, where folks were caught by surprise.

You might have as much as 10 hours to get ready, you might have 45 minutes.  What would you take?  I like to think I am not attached to stuff, but I would take my yarn.  Well, the good stuff anyway.  Other than the pictures of my wedding and some of the kids baby pictures, I like to think I wouldn't miss anything else.  I'm sure my kids would really want me to grab their blankets and special stuffed toys.  Of course we would grab our grab and go bag.

But, when you start to think about what it would be like to pick up the pieces of your life after your house is cinders.  Replacing all the detritus that makes our lives comfortable and functional, it is over-whelming.  Yet, my family lived through a massive fire shortly after I graduated from college.  I remember being at a party some years later and one of the families that didn't loose their house had an interesting perspective.  My friend's Dad said that in the beginning they were so happy that their house was safe.  But, then they felt guilty, why were they spared while others burned?  It impacted their relationships with their neighborhood friends.  Then they watched their neighbors rebuild new, fancy houses.  Kitchens got granite counters and bathrooms were robed in marble.  Suddenly his older home looked small and shabby by comparison.  He said, he was really jealous of his neighbors new homes.  He said that in the end it would probably have been best to have his house burn like everyone else.  I thought that was so interesting.  There is an interesting sociological point here about fitting in with the social norms, but that isn't the point.

My mother and I joke that the problems with our house are best solved with a match.  Sure rebuilding would enable me to fix all the issues with the house, it is a long and complicated process.  Not one I'm sure I can manage.  But, if everyone is going to loose their house, I guess it is just stuff and I can replace stuff.

What would the other ladies save?  Check them out at: Froggie, Momarock, and Merrylandgirl.

The best country

For this week, in early anticipation of Independence Day, the topic choice was: “America”
Since July 4th is coming up the following week (but the next post will be after the holiday), I thought we could write about anything to do with America. Favorite places to go, favorite songs about America, what makes you American/how living in America has affected your personality, favorite presidents, etc. anything goes!

To begin, I was at soccer.  It was one of our last games and Hannah was impressed with my wedding ring.  The other family I was talking with asked what she was saying.  I explained that she liked my ring and that I told her this is the one Daddy gave me when he promised to marry me and this is the one that he gave me when he did.  The husband of the couple laughs and says, "I didn't give her a big ring, I brought her to America.  The best country in the world."

Our soccer team is comprised of many families that have recently moved to our country.  Over half our team is first generation Americans.  These are families, that in some cases didn't even speak english when they moved here.  Imagine, leaving everything you know and moving to a country where you can not even speak the language.  Yet, they do it because it is the best country in the world. 

It makes me appreciate what I was born too.  It really is just luck of the draw to be born to any specific situation.  As the birthday of our country approaches, it is important to remember that many people sacrafic everything to come here for more opportunity and choices for their families.  Think how lucky most of us are to have just been born here.

Want to see what the other ladies have to say on the topic?  Check them out at: Froggie, Momarock, and Merrylandgirl.

RAK

The topic for this weeks post is about random acts of kindness.  I have experienced many random acts of kindness in my life, and have written about them in this space.

I have shared about the time the lady bought us all skittles at the grocery store because I was cranky and the kids were irritating me.  She looked at me with a kind smile and said I had really good kids.  My kids were thrilled with the candy and it changed the mood for everyone.

I have also talked about the many people that sent me things from yarn to flowers on my front porch during the time when Bob was unemployed.  I was given food and Halloween costumes.  My community, be it knitters or school families, pitched in and offered us some sort of assistance.  It was pretty awesome.

So, when I read the topic, I thought, well yeah I have been on the receiving end of such things.  I have randomly done things for people too.  I have shared about a lot of that in this space, so I thought, what new ground can I cover?  Then I remembered....

Mac was my only child, and I was between jobs again.  I was struggling with what my next move would be.  As I was searching for a new position, I was going on a lot of out of town interviews.  This meant I was parking and flying a lot.  The driver on the bus was a skinny man from Jamaica.  He had a good word for everyone and always tried to go out of his way to be helpful.  He always took my bags, even when I insisted I could handle it.

I never really talked to him, but one day I was the only passenger on the bus.  I had come back from a particularly bad interview.  I was not happy with the prospect of moving to work for this company and all the rejection was starting to get to me.  The driver took my bags, smiled at me an I sat down.  We waited and then the radio said that he could return to base.   Before he closed the doors on the bus he turned to me and he said, you know, I have something I really want to tell you... you are really pretty.  He turned and drove me back to the base and helped me put my bags in my car.  As we parted ways, he smiled again and told me good luck.

While it seems like nothing, it was something to me at that time.  I was feeling very bad about myself, and it was so kind of him to say that.  It really made me feel better.  I looked for him every time I parked, but I never saw him again.  I always felt like he was an angel that day, because while his words were few, something about them changed how I felt that day.

Want to see what the other ladies have to say? Check them out at: Froggie, Momarock, and Merrylandgirl.

Letters to Me

This weeks topic is to write a letter to yourself...

Dear High School Graduate:

As you embark on your "new" life, you will encounter many things that you will think you can not handle.  Remember that you can.  You can do anything you want to do.  There will be challenges that seem insurmountable, but no matter how hard things may seem at the moment you will overcome.

Something to keep in mind, as you are overcoming:  What is the desired outcome.  You have a tendency to fight for the sake of fighting without thinking about the outcome.  What is it that you want?  Once you know what you want, then take steps to get it, don't just engage in perceived injustice.  It will make your life easier if you focus on the goal and let the other stuff go, it is just noise anyway.

There will be days that it feels like you will be alone, but you won't.  You will find the right one, it just will take you longer than your friends.  But, shh, here is a secret, they will all get divorced and you will be the only one that is still married.  It is worth the wait, trust me. 

Try and enjoy your time in college, don't worry so much about the social stuff.  If you relax and are yourself, things will go much more smoothly.  I realize that you don't really know who you are, but finding a boyfriend isn't going to change that.  Focus on meeting people, don't put so much pressure on yourself.  It will work out, but you have to be a friend to have a friend.

You might want to study a bit more than you want to... college isn't as easy as high school.  Even though you don't think it is important now, you are actually learning some good things.

Oh, and when you are on your ski trip and the car breaks down... just take it slow and be cool.  You can't keep up with the boys, don't try.  They all like you and won't care that you aren't as "tough" as they are... they aren't really all that tough anyway. 

Be sure and tell Dad you love him every chance you get.  David isn't always an annoying jerk.. Dad was right when he said someday you will be friends.

Hang in there, things really do work out ok.

Your Older Self


The other ladies wrote letters too... check them out at: Froggie, Momarock, and Merrylandgirl.