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My sister meme-tagged me, and since it's obvious I'm not going to get around to posting any of the many things I wanted to post anytime soon, I shall just copycat her posts!
1. It's so nice to have one working computer for once! My friends and family, who are way too nice to me, got me a new battery and new power cord for Christmas, and I can actually like unplug my laptop and take it places now! The result is that I'm paranoid that something else on it will break now that they've spent all that money on it. And my desktop computer is deeply enough broken now that I need to just take a day digging in the guts of it and probably give up and install a real Linux distro on it. Also, I lost the stylus to my drawing tablet before Christmas and still haven't found it, and I srsly miss it every day (it's got to be in the house somewhere, but where?) But laptop! And new hard drive full of music is still awesome!
2. The only elective body mods I've ever had are braces and my wisdom teeth out. I regret both of these. They spent three years moving my teeth closer together, and then we got a new orthodontist, and he spent three years moving them farther apart, and then gave me a retainer and said I'd have to wear it forever, at which point I "lost" it conveniently and never went back. And I blame my current dental issues on the weird relationship with my teeth that gave me. And I'm paranoid that the empty places where my wisdom teeth were will go wrong - the healed places there feel weird sometimes - and I was never convinced it was in any way necessary, except to make my parents feel better. Also, this. If I die because my parents caved to cultural pressure, I expect a really good funeral.
3. I really believe that having a church, as distinct from faith, is a very valuable thing. A church provides the local, extended family/village network that modern demographic patterns have lost to so many people, and that's useful and important, and has saved me, personally, more than once, in a more tangible way than Jesus ever could. There are other ways of getting that in-person network, but few of them cross class, generational, and even cultural barriers the way a good church family does. Which is also why I despise megachurches - if your church is too big to sit down for a communal meal together, you've lost the whole point of having a church. Of course, there are a lot of bad church families that'll screw you up even worse than your biological one, and I consider myself very lucky to have the church family I do, which is why I've put off and put off finding a new church when I move.
4. I've ridden an airplane once in my life. I must have been about 3. The flight attendent asked if this was my first plane ride, and I said "Yes, and knowing my parents, probably my last, too." She patted me on the head and laughed at me and talked over my head, and I grumped, because I knew I was right (and I was right, too. :P) Most of my vivid early memories involve cases where I was right and the grown-ups discounted me. I must have brooded on them a lot. (I must have been a very annoying child.)
5. I have the legal name I do because my grandmother didn't want her grandchildren to have the same name as a black lady. Trufax. I didn't learn the full story of this until I was in college; before that I was just told she thought it sounded too "childish". (My parents called me by the original name anyway, which probably led to my fondness for stories about true names and how naming matters.)
6. I could have skipped first grade. I could have skipped a year of high school, too, but I didn't, because they'd already decided with my sister that social development was more important, and who was I to try something my sister hadn't managed? In restrospect, I kind of wish I had, because it's not like I worked at the social stuff either, and I always seemed to be better friends with the students a few years ahead anyway, and if I'd spent my childhood being encouraged to push myself (instead of to hang back and let the others catch up) I would probably have turned into a much more admirable and effective adult. Possibly a less zen and widely-read one, though.
7. Every time I see my sister lately I notice how thin her hair looks on top and have to bite my tongue not to tease her about it. This makes me paranoid about mine. Especially since I've had dandruff for years, hidden under my hair that is so thick it devours small objects and animals.
8. Someday I want to try getting high on chocolate. Even though I've never tried any other psychoactive drugs and don't even like caffeine. The issue with chocolate is that digestive enzymes rapidly degrade the most powerful psychoactives in it; the Mesoamericans had two ways of bypassing that - one was mix the drugs with really strong chili oils to stun the stomach glands; the other, even the people on Erowid haven't tried with chocolate yet.
9. My sexuality is "present", which is actually a somewhat new thing. I still haven't figured out what it is other than that. I suppose that's better than the people who turn thirty and realize they've been wrong all those years, though. (For identity politics purposes I'm still pretty strongly asexual, because that's the closest to how I've experienced it culturally. Asexuals unite!)
10. The big box o' papers I saved is the only thing of mine still at Mom's house that I haven't touched in the process of moving out. I should, but I dread going through it and either being unable to get rid of any of it, or getting rid of stuff that I will later regret not having. The alternative, though, is to turn into Grandma.
11. I love the way my family's Christmas tree looks, the beauty that comes with so many, so random ornaments that it becomes something else entirely, a Victorian cabinet of wonders. But I've also, ever since I was a little girl, loved the Christmas trees that were color-coordinated, and had matching ornaments, and everything was themed and carefully placed, and I wanted one. This makes me feel deeply guilty about killing the true spirits of Christmas, because those artsy designed trees, clearly, are not made with LOVE. Luckily, I now have so many family, given-with-love ornaments that I can decorate a reasonably-sized tree *with* a coordinated theme using only ones I've picked out of those old sentimental ornaments.
12. Sometimes I worry about how well I deal with death. I feel like I never reacted enough to my father's death (or any of my other close deaths); but either I never got out of denial, or I skipped all the steps that are supposed to come before acceptance. On the other hand, I spent about a year in middle school absolutely failing to deal well with death; I couldn't turn out the light at night because I would start thinking about how someday, people I loved were going to die, and I didn't know what was going to happen, and the only way to avoid that happening would be if I died first (because my parents were fairly old when they had us, and my grandparents even older), and if I died first then *they* would have to deal with it, which would be even worse, and I'd end up trying to not cry into a pillow ... But eventually I worked through it and decided that loved ones dying was going to happen and yes, I could handle that. So maybe I just got out a lifetime's worth of mourning ahead of time.
13. My advisor in college recommended several times that I see a psychologist, and I never did, because I felt like that would be silly to pay someone to talk to me when I had resources like family, and church, and friends, and people who I know would be friends if I let them, who I could talk it out with, and I hadn't even tried that yet. And I did start making myself reach out to those people, and it helped, because I like myself and my life a lot more than I did then, and I'm happy with where I am, and mostly happy with who I am. ...thing is, now I've done that, there are all these people around to be worried about me, and I don't like causing worry. I still think a psychologist would be a waste, though, because I do like who I am and where I am, and have no particular desire to do or be anything else, so I'm not sure what, exactly, therapy would do except make me as stressed as the rest of 'em.
14. I'm really good at tuning things out. To the point where, if I want to listen to music, I have to purposely set time aside, or I won't even notice I've heard it. I kind of miss having a long commute 'cause of that.
15. I really like lower marine invertebrates. Once you get to seashells and crustaceans they start getting boring, but give me a treatise on cnidaria or echinoderms and I'm there, baby. This goes back to elementary school: I'm may have been the only kid in that school to do a 1st-grade science report on nudibrachs. They're just so *amazing* and *alien* and beautiful and complicated for all that they're so simple.
16. I have way too much stuff, and I'm frighteningly good at fitting it all into a small living space, but everything I have is something I have for a reason and because it's actually useful, and I almost never buy things. I grew up in families where nothing got thrown away, so I'm used to the idea that if you need something, you either have it already, make it yourself out of parts you have already, or you wait around a few weeks to see if either it drops into your lap or you realize you don't really need it that much. People who just go out and buy stuff puzzle me. But sometimes I'm afraid I've become Scarlett O'hara.
1. It's so nice to have one working computer for once! My friends and family, who are way too nice to me, got me a new battery and new power cord for Christmas, and I can actually like unplug my laptop and take it places now! The result is that I'm paranoid that something else on it will break now that they've spent all that money on it. And my desktop computer is deeply enough broken now that I need to just take a day digging in the guts of it and probably give up and install a real Linux distro on it. Also, I lost the stylus to my drawing tablet before Christmas and still haven't found it, and I srsly miss it every day (it's got to be in the house somewhere, but where?) But laptop! And new hard drive full of music is still awesome!
2. The only elective body mods I've ever had are braces and my wisdom teeth out. I regret both of these. They spent three years moving my teeth closer together, and then we got a new orthodontist, and he spent three years moving them farther apart, and then gave me a retainer and said I'd have to wear it forever, at which point I "lost" it conveniently and never went back. And I blame my current dental issues on the weird relationship with my teeth that gave me. And I'm paranoid that the empty places where my wisdom teeth were will go wrong - the healed places there feel weird sometimes - and I was never convinced it was in any way necessary, except to make my parents feel better. Also, this. If I die because my parents caved to cultural pressure, I expect a really good funeral.
3. I really believe that having a church, as distinct from faith, is a very valuable thing. A church provides the local, extended family/village network that modern demographic patterns have lost to so many people, and that's useful and important, and has saved me, personally, more than once, in a more tangible way than Jesus ever could. There are other ways of getting that in-person network, but few of them cross class, generational, and even cultural barriers the way a good church family does. Which is also why I despise megachurches - if your church is too big to sit down for a communal meal together, you've lost the whole point of having a church. Of course, there are a lot of bad church families that'll screw you up even worse than your biological one, and I consider myself very lucky to have the church family I do, which is why I've put off and put off finding a new church when I move.
4. I've ridden an airplane once in my life. I must have been about 3. The flight attendent asked if this was my first plane ride, and I said "Yes, and knowing my parents, probably my last, too." She patted me on the head and laughed at me and talked over my head, and I grumped, because I knew I was right (and I was right, too. :P) Most of my vivid early memories involve cases where I was right and the grown-ups discounted me. I must have brooded on them a lot. (I must have been a very annoying child.)
5. I have the legal name I do because my grandmother didn't want her grandchildren to have the same name as a black lady. Trufax. I didn't learn the full story of this until I was in college; before that I was just told she thought it sounded too "childish". (My parents called me by the original name anyway, which probably led to my fondness for stories about true names and how naming matters.)
6. I could have skipped first grade. I could have skipped a year of high school, too, but I didn't, because they'd already decided with my sister that social development was more important, and who was I to try something my sister hadn't managed? In restrospect, I kind of wish I had, because it's not like I worked at the social stuff either, and I always seemed to be better friends with the students a few years ahead anyway, and if I'd spent my childhood being encouraged to push myself (instead of to hang back and let the others catch up) I would probably have turned into a much more admirable and effective adult. Possibly a less zen and widely-read one, though.
7. Every time I see my sister lately I notice how thin her hair looks on top and have to bite my tongue not to tease her about it. This makes me paranoid about mine. Especially since I've had dandruff for years, hidden under my hair that is so thick it devours small objects and animals.
8. Someday I want to try getting high on chocolate. Even though I've never tried any other psychoactive drugs and don't even like caffeine. The issue with chocolate is that digestive enzymes rapidly degrade the most powerful psychoactives in it; the Mesoamericans had two ways of bypassing that - one was mix the drugs with really strong chili oils to stun the stomach glands; the other, even the people on Erowid haven't tried with chocolate yet.
9. My sexuality is "present", which is actually a somewhat new thing. I still haven't figured out what it is other than that. I suppose that's better than the people who turn thirty and realize they've been wrong all those years, though. (For identity politics purposes I'm still pretty strongly asexual, because that's the closest to how I've experienced it culturally. Asexuals unite!)
10. The big box o' papers I saved is the only thing of mine still at Mom's house that I haven't touched in the process of moving out. I should, but I dread going through it and either being unable to get rid of any of it, or getting rid of stuff that I will later regret not having. The alternative, though, is to turn into Grandma.
11. I love the way my family's Christmas tree looks, the beauty that comes with so many, so random ornaments that it becomes something else entirely, a Victorian cabinet of wonders. But I've also, ever since I was a little girl, loved the Christmas trees that were color-coordinated, and had matching ornaments, and everything was themed and carefully placed, and I wanted one. This makes me feel deeply guilty about killing the true spirits of Christmas, because those artsy designed trees, clearly, are not made with LOVE. Luckily, I now have so many family, given-with-love ornaments that I can decorate a reasonably-sized tree *with* a coordinated theme using only ones I've picked out of those old sentimental ornaments.
12. Sometimes I worry about how well I deal with death. I feel like I never reacted enough to my father's death (or any of my other close deaths); but either I never got out of denial, or I skipped all the steps that are supposed to come before acceptance. On the other hand, I spent about a year in middle school absolutely failing to deal well with death; I couldn't turn out the light at night because I would start thinking about how someday, people I loved were going to die, and I didn't know what was going to happen, and the only way to avoid that happening would be if I died first (because my parents were fairly old when they had us, and my grandparents even older), and if I died first then *they* would have to deal with it, which would be even worse, and I'd end up trying to not cry into a pillow ... But eventually I worked through it and decided that loved ones dying was going to happen and yes, I could handle that. So maybe I just got out a lifetime's worth of mourning ahead of time.
13. My advisor in college recommended several times that I see a psychologist, and I never did, because I felt like that would be silly to pay someone to talk to me when I had resources like family, and church, and friends, and people who I know would be friends if I let them, who I could talk it out with, and I hadn't even tried that yet. And I did start making myself reach out to those people, and it helped, because I like myself and my life a lot more than I did then, and I'm happy with where I am, and mostly happy with who I am. ...thing is, now I've done that, there are all these people around to be worried about me, and I don't like causing worry. I still think a psychologist would be a waste, though, because I do like who I am and where I am, and have no particular desire to do or be anything else, so I'm not sure what, exactly, therapy would do except make me as stressed as the rest of 'em.
14. I'm really good at tuning things out. To the point where, if I want to listen to music, I have to purposely set time aside, or I won't even notice I've heard it. I kind of miss having a long commute 'cause of that.
15. I really like lower marine invertebrates. Once you get to seashells and crustaceans they start getting boring, but give me a treatise on cnidaria or echinoderms and I'm there, baby. This goes back to elementary school: I'm may have been the only kid in that school to do a 1st-grade science report on nudibrachs. They're just so *amazing* and *alien* and beautiful and complicated for all that they're so simple.
16. I have way too much stuff, and I'm frighteningly good at fitting it all into a small living space, but everything I have is something I have for a reason and because it's actually useful, and I almost never buy things. I grew up in families where nothing got thrown away, so I'm used to the idea that if you need something, you either have it already, make it yourself out of parts you have already, or you wait around a few weeks to see if either it drops into your lap or you realize you don't really need it that much. People who just go out and buy stuff puzzle me. But sometimes I'm afraid I've become Scarlett O'hara.
no subject
8. You REFUSED to try my chili chocolate when I offered, I'll have you recall.
11. Nice twist you put on that one there. XD
no subject
(Kevin bought some later, I tried his. It was okay but not mystically life-changing. But then I only had one square.)