50 Things You Might Not Know About Me

My good friend Soledad created this list in her blog, and I just had to try it out for myself. Truthfully, I don't know that I can come up with 50, but it's worth a try. I do love making lists. I'll try to make this unique.

1. I'm the only person in my immediate family to be born in the U.S. The rest - my parents, my two sisters - were born in Argentina, and are often reluctant to tell me anything about what it was like to live there.

2. I have a crazy fear of roller coasters that, no doubt, comes from a serious car accident I was in when I was 3. My mother's car was parked on a hill, I released the parking brake, and my middle sister and I rode it all the way down as it jumped a curb, flipped over, pancaked, and dumped us out. My sister had the only injury, cuts on her knees from the glass.

3. I used to have long hair shortly after high school, when I was into heavy metal. Garage bands, guitars, bandanas...that was rock in the 80s.

4. I once supplied the voice of Mickey Mouse for Michael Eisner's (he was the prez of Disney) very first personal computer.

5. As a sophmore in high school, I broke my left forearm in a 90 degree angle. That was the easy part. Resetting it was hard.

6. As a child, I had a recurring nightmare of falling off the roof of a 6 story building.

7. I took piano lessons when I was three but abandoned them shortly after. I picked the piano back up when I took it upon myself to tune the family's piano when I was a teenager.

8. When I started learning how to play the guitar, I played two or three hours a day.

9. I only eat one item on my plate at a time. I don't like to mix up my tastes.

10. I've been to Hawaii over 20 times, made possible by the fact that my dad worked for the airlines.

11. My mother altered just about every piece of clothing I wore, because she was, professionally, a seamstress. Carol Burnett even specifically requested my mom when she wanted a few dresses made.

12. I have fired, due to the generosity of a friend, an automatic .45, .38 snub nose revolver, and a .22 rifle. Ahh hang on - I think Chuck Heston is at my door.

13. I don't know how to swim. Oh yeah, another traumatic childhood incident when I almost drowned.

14. I've played guitar with a band in front of 2,000 people, and solo in front of 500.

15. I attended college twice, once as a music major, then a few years later as a theater major, english minor. I never finished.

16. I memorize music by attributing colors and shapes to it.

17. I've been keeping a journal (now this blog) since 1984.

18. I wrote my first play in about an hour.

19. I can speak Spanish, but not write it correctly. I still think in English and only grew up speaking Spanish with my mother. Oh, come to think of it....

20. I grew up speaking English with everyone in my family but my mom. My sisters speak English with each other but Spanish with my parents.

21. I almost always have a guitar pick on me, for luck.

22. I once worked at the Wherehouse (video and music) for one summer, and that was the only retail job I've had.

23. I was a video game tester at Disney.

24. I was online during the early days of the Internet.

25. When I was in grade school, I was teased and harassed by a group of kids in my class. That lasted for years until I actually started fighting back.

26. My first kiss was in 1st grade. I still remember the nacho cheese on her lips from the Doritos.

27. I was an altar boy (and no, I'm not repressing any memories).

28. I used to drive a Jeep Wrangler and loved everything about it except for the frequency of tow trucks and visits to my mechanic.

29. I've been in two car accidents where I was the driver.

30. I once did a 50 mile bicycle race in Mexico and got my bike up to a little over 65mph on a downhill stretch.

31. I've written over 20 plays and produced six of them.

32. I'm both a neat freak and a pack rat. I think there's something in the pleasure of having so much to clean up. I love throwing things away.

33. I have six guitars and one keyboard.

34. I don't often go to parties. As a matter of fact, I've only ever actually had three birthday parties (not including ones I had as a child).

35. When I was a child, I created illustrated books of poetry.

36. After high school, I wrote a book of just over 100 songs and then five years later, shredded the whole bunch.

37. Thanks to breaking a bone in my left hand in the early 90s, I have seven visible knuckles when I close my fists.

38. I was a football player in grade school and a track athlete in high school.

39. When email was fairly new, I had a pen pal for about seven years. Everything was awesome until she moved out here.

40. My mother was 40 when she had me.

41. My addiction for DVDs has waned only a little bit - I have nearly 300 and can now resist temptation, even when they're on sale.

42. I've been a loyal Laker fan since the 70s.

43. I was once a personal assistant for a brilliant actress.

44. I'm allergic to penicillin. In fact, I'm not even sure I'm spelling it right.

45. I'm the go-to person for creative stuff at work, and I totally don't even see the importance of it. Why? That's just dumb.

46. I'm fascinated by religion but could be described as agnostic.

47. I used to be a Disneyana collector. In my collection: a 1939 record set of Snow White & the Seven Dwarves, a 1969 map of Disneyland, a light from the Electric Light Parade

48. I spent nearly every weekend at the theater for two years, for both matinee and evening performances, PLUS rehearsals during the week at night after a full-time job.

49. (matching Sole's 49) I type nearly 100wpm, once clocked at 98wpm on a 5 minute test, and 85wpm on a manual typewriter.

50. I still have the blanket I was brought home in from the hospital.

Whew! I didn't...think...I could come up with that many things. Are they interesting? Hmm.
Well, YOU try to do it. There. The gauntlet has been thrown down.

Current Mood

I find it really ground-breaking that MySpace has given us the power to choose our mood in the new status section. Whether you choose happy or sad, that must be what you want to feel, isn't it? It's alarmingly convenient and effective.

With a couple of very quiet days at work around me like an ocean around a small island, I started doing some maintenance and found myself missing old friends when I ran across their emails.

C: All of your old friends?

S: No, not really.

C: Not the recent ones you broke off contact with?

S: I didn't ceremoniously break contact, Christy. It's nothing as big as that.

C: Do you talk to them any more?

S: No, not really.

C: Are you making any effort?

S: Friendships shouldn't be a lot of work, should they?

C: What I'm getting at is -

S: I was beginning to wonder.

C: What I'm getting at is this. You were trying to re-establish one friendship, another was a daily thing, another hit one snag and -

S: And what? How long is this list? Should I keep every habit in my life whether it's working or not?

C: Meaning?

S: Do I drink soda any more?

C: No.

S: I stopped drinking it for my health. I also eat a lot better. As I get older, I'm beginning to see the difference between just seeing myself in context with the things that make up my life, and having the option to stop doing things that don't work for me. Other people around me more or less believe the same thing, only they try to change the existing things...and people around them to suit their needs and ideas.

C: Damn.

S: What?

C: For some reason, that got all complicated. I thought it was going to be an easier explanation.

S: Okay, umm...maybe it felt more complicated to you because I'm writing both sides of this conversation. Would it have been easier if I just said, "I've had it and don't want to deal any more?"

C: No, that feels...unsatisfying and out of character.

S: Well, I choose to be happy, and that means making some tough choices.

C: So that's it? The very second someone does something wrong you're going to bail and dump them?

S: No! That's kind of harsh and blunt. Look, I love the imperfect perfection of the whole world around me, and...oh, I feel I need to say this: I'm flawed. I do and say the wrong things sometimes and have been lucky to find a few people who forgive me, and know how to share that blame and forgiveness when it's called for. I just...think that...sometimes things work and sometimes they don't.

C: Kind of like a key, right?

S: Maybe not that exclusive, but yeah, kind of like that.

C: I'm a little worried, though.

S: About what?

C: You could shut yourself off completely and go crazy.

S: Sometimes I need to, though. Sometimes I need to climb a mountain without reaching for a hand up.

C: Or dead weight, or the knowledge that anone got up before you did.

S: (pause) Sort of, yeah. (pause) But there are some people I will never shut out completely.

C: Who?

S: They know.

C: Aren't you overthinking this whole thing?

S: Aren't you the one who brought it up?

C: Yeah. One more question. What if you make a mistake?

S: Mistakes...is there such a thing when one doesn't believe in regret? Little things between friends can be healed and mended, but the bigger decisions...well, they are what they are, aren't they?

We're all imperfect, and everything is so temporary. Sometimes we come across puzzling people we're fascinated with until the mystery (ha - I almost wrote misery) either unravels or enfuriates us. Sometimes we just come across people who keep us company for part of the journey. It's easy to accept things the way they are until years pass by and you're standing in the same spot you were, dreaming of change. What I'm looking at is the bottom line, and how the things in my life add up to that. It means not being afraid to change the pieces out and try new ones. It means letting go of things that have been comfortable and familiar.

Sometimes it means whispering a little goodbye and not trying to take everything with you.

I clicked on happiness.