I so liked this post from Lisa Sonora Beam of things she is too shy to tell us. Lisa!
In the past I have avoid the “X things you don’t know about me” genre because you guys already know so many screwed up personal things about me, like how I met my duck and talk to monsters and lived in an abandoned building in East Berlin and have multiple selves who have secret lairs.
And because the rest always seems too obvious and therefore boring (I don’t eat sugar! I make my own conditioner! I italicize too much!)
Also, the stuff I NEVER tell you is stuff I never tell you for a reason, so yeah, obviously I’m not going to tell you now either.
But her post struck a nerve with its sweet shyness that I relate to too much.
So: some things you might not know that don’t fall under Shockingly Dull (Or: I Cannot Ever Say This Online Or Anywhere).
A note about “shy”.
I don’t really so much identify with shy as misanthropic but whatever. I am an extreme introvert who dislikes a) noise and b) being around more than a couple people at a time and c) most people, in general. Hmmm. Yeah, okay, I guess I’m shy.
Actually, highly sensitive is (for me) the accurate term. So maybe start there?
I am a highly sensitive person.
It was a huge relief to read Elaine Aron’s book Highly Sensitive People and realize there was a word for what I am, and that there is a world of people who are strange in the way that I am strange.
I actually called my brother and said, “Someone wrote a biography of us!”
It explained a lot.
Things that make me crazy.
Car alarms. That truck-backing-up-beeping sound. The phrase “stop crying”.
I always have ear plugs with me.
Usually a spare pair too, if you need one.
I am weird about words.
No kidding. I’m the only biggified blogger I know who has to have a Glossary.
And, unsurprisingly, most of my idiosyncracies are word-related.
Oh, just a tiny smattering of the many words that are physically painful for me to see or hear:
diphthong, caulk, childish, Whig, magenta.
Also: coagulate, dextrose, mercenary.
A word that make me giggle: Stopcock. So funny! I am six years old.
I am not susceptible to whatever biological and/or cultural programming makes people want to give birth to other smaller people.
Actually, I find it fascinating that people reproduce, in any way other than by accident.
I am also — not knowing what it is like any other way — quite happy to have missed that gene or not been influenced by social pressure or whatever it is that makes people do this thing whose appeal clearly must exist and yet is not apparent to me.
And I find it extremely odd when people imply that I will “change my mind”, as if this is a decision that I actively made and not a simple truth of my life.
But one of my favorite things to do is baby-watch.
I like to sit in a cafe and make silly faces at wide-eyed infants and wave at the chubby toddlers in their stripey pants.
Do not sit with me in a cafe if you want to talk, because I will probably be too busy baby-watching.
Babies! Astonishing and charming and endlessly entertaining. I like being around them and loving them and wishing them wonderful things.
I dislike and resent being asked what I do.
This is why I studiously avoid most situations in which I need to meet people who do not already know who I am.
I also avoid marketing people who think I need an elevator speech.
Believe me, I would rather be phobic of elevators for the rest of my life than spend the time figuring out what I do. I want what I do to be able to change. All the time. And to never have to talk about it.
It’s probably also why I like babies. They’ve never asked me that. Not once.
I also don’t know what I do.
And I don’t care.
Luckily I make very good money not knowing what I do, so I’ve given myself permission to stop worrying about it. And I wasn’t kidding. I don’t take elevators. But not because of elevator speeches. That would be stupid.
Speaking of elevators, once I got trapped in an elevator. In Poland.
Which is basically the worst place to get trapped in an elevator.
Switzerland would be nice. Except that elevators don’t break in Switzerland. Ever. Extra points for Switzerland!
We were stuck between floors. In between. The guy I was stuck in the elevator with was having a massive panic attack and screaming WE’RE GOING TO DIE! WE’RE GOING TO DIE IN POLAND!
He got so upset and frantic that he started jumping, which made the elevator shake and then sink about a foot. Unpleasant. Eventually some people came and got the door open and pulled us up and out.
But that’s not why I don’t take elevators either.
I like to walk. I dislike confined spaces. I don’t see the point.
I moved living situations over thirty times between the age of twenty and thirty.
It sucked.
Once I got propositioned by my landlord, who wanted me to work for him as a call girl.
I wish I could say that was my worst living situation but it wasn’t.
I love water.
But not being in it. Looking at it.
Actually, there are lots of things in my life like this.
For example, I obsess over basketball and love watching Roller Derby (my duck and I sponsor a team!) but I would rather die than play a team sport. Well, any sport. But team sports specifically.
Or: I love teaching retreats and workshops. But going to one? Ohmygod.
I don’t see why I need to be good at “public” speaking.
I’m brilliant at it when it’s talking to my people. And I’m absolutely fine speaking to hundreds and probably thousands of people if they’re already fans of what I do.
But the thought of talking to people who aren’t my people — who don’t even know my duck?! — is both terrifying and not interesting at the same time.
People keep telling me I need to get over this. But I don’t see why I should have to. If you happen to know, please don’t tell me.
I am not adventurous.
I like routine. Once I know what I like, I don’t need to try other things.
No one believes me when I say this because I have moved countries three times and done all sorts of extremely bizarre and unlikely things in my life.
But, for example, during the two weeks I just spent in Taos I went to the same restaurant every night, sat at the same table and ordered the exact same thing.
It was lovely.
Someone once told me that Picasso was exactly like that.
I have no idea if that’s true but it was extremely reassuring to hear.
I don’t like it when people refer to fear as “irrational”.
If you’re scared of something, you’re scared of it.
I don’t care whether or not I know or remember the reason. And I don’t necessarily need to figure out what’s going on. It’s my fear and therefore it makes sense and is legitimate.
I feel very strongly about this.
Things I am RATIONALLY afraid of which (the fears, not the things) do not always make sense to other people:
Men with facial hair. Not all men with facial hair. But a lot of them.
Vans. RVs. Also cars with tinted windows.
Someone kidnapping my duck.
Getting sick.
Being grabbed by the elbow. I will hurt you if you ever do this to me and that would be a terrible thing so do not test this.
Things I talk to:
Trees. Dead people. Walls. Not just internal walls but the partitions that make up buildings. Myself.
I do not like surprises.
I also don’t ever answer the phone or open the door, so if you want to surprise me you’re going to be disappointed.
Oh and I got carded last week.
That was AWESOME. And bizarre.
Much blushing and batting of eyelashes ensued. Flattery will get you everywhere, apparently.
Also I really like being divorced.
There is such freedom in knowing what you don’t want.
Running out of things so I will add that I have a degree in History from Tel Aviv University.
I have nothing to add to that.
That’s got to be enough, right?
That’s 23 things.
I think. Not so good at counting.
Ha. If you add that one, it’s twenty-four things. I don’t know that I can come up with more.
Comment zen for today…
You know what would be nice? I would like to know a thing or things about you too.
Unless you don’t feel like it, in which case, that’s fine by me.
Really, if I were going to add a twenty-fifth thing it would probably be that I hardly ever comment on people’s blogs because I never know what to say.
So here we are. We all have our stuff. We’re all working on our stuff. Sometimes reading about someone else’s stuff sets off our own stuff. That’s what destuckification is all about.
Part of the way we let everyone have their own experience is by not giving advice, unless people specifically ask for it.
Here’s a specific request, related to that: I really do not wish to be told that actually having children is marvelous. I’m sure it is. For someone who is not me.
You are welcome to have your way. And I need space for my way to be legitimate too.
Love to all the commenter mice, the Beloved Lurkers and everyone who reads.
Follow
I can’t think of anything to say because I am sitting blinking at the idea that I don’t need to define (or even KNOW) what it is I do.
And that it can CHANGE.
Because I do know, but it’s more like I recognise the character of it, its face, its personality than it be… something like ‘I do x for y-ey z’s.’
The Queen of Permission strikes (allows?) again.
You so great.
.-= Andrew Lightheart´s last post … I got nothing but I like you =-.
I love it.
I feel the same way about having children. Love them. Enjoy being around them. Have no interest or desire or wish to actually produce them or live with them.
I’ll share two:
1. I can read really fast. People tell me that I must be just flipping pages. I’m not. I’m actually reading. No idea how I do this – it’s just normal. Also useful.
2. I can’t swear. We weren’t allowed to swear when I was little, and then I just never started – it felt like I was trying to force myself to do something that felt unnatural to me. The closest I can come is to say “Oh, bother.” Oddly, people are always apologizing to me for swearing. This makes me sad because I like people to feel comfortable and I worry that they think I actually mind if they do swear. (I don’t.)
.-= Elizabeth´s last post … ode to joy- volume 32 =-.
Thank goodness you don’t know what you do! It’s such a relief. It may sound mad, but now I feel like I have permission to go and redo my website to reflect the fact that I’m not clear, either. Why I needed permission, I have no idea – in fact, I had no idea I needed it until I got it.
Also, not having children seemed devastating when I was told I couldn’t without lots of fertility therapy (including intrusive and stressful procedures). Deciding NOT to put ourselves through the potentially gruelling hell of fertility therapy but just accept where we were and be the best aunty and uncle we could be did great things for both of us – and not only was that decision not respected by people (some of whom we DID NOT KNOW) who tried to persuade us into doing it, but I was told I was “selfish”! Other Half wasn’t, but I was, because women are apparently abnormal if they make a decision to not have kids or just don’t want to. Neither of us actually wants to produce our own infant now, or adopt, and we adore kids.
And so many people have children and yet appear not to like them very much, which is somehow not noticed.
My sister got sick and tired of people touching her pregnant belly and telling her what to do with her small children.
Other people’s reproductive decisions seem to trigger so many people to be REALLY RUDE AND OFFENSIVE. But I have decided that it is very, very sad that they haven’t learned a) to examine their assumptions, or b) to play nice.
Love your post and Lisa’s post!
I have also forgotten to queue when the mother gene was handed out and I am totally ok with it but also hate it when people think I should or will change my mind (I am 40) or start throwing shoes by telling me that I will de desperately unhappy when I am old. There are many kids I adore but I prefer the rental children version. Babysitting for a few hours, doing stuff together and then handing them back to their parents. There is a great book on the subject which I may have mentioned in a former comment, “Beyond Motherhood” by Jeanne Safer.
Water – I grew up in a town on the Baltic Sea and don’t sail or windsurf or have any other water-related hobby apart from walks on the beach. I love to be by the water: sea, rivers, lakes, but I hardly have an incentive to go in. And diving would be my absolute nightmare.
I don’t know how to suppress a sneeze. I love sneezing very loud.
I think we should just declare that Stopcock is funny at any age.
.-= Amy Crook´s last post … Self Sufficient =-.
This is lovely.
It’s reassuring to see the pattern of the same place-each-time thign here, because that’s something I can identify with. Same about words and public speaking.
It’s reassuring, as already stated, that you don’t know what you do. I’m about to enter my ifnal year of University where everyone asks what you’re going to do and who you’re going to be. Ack. I love that I can have the option of not knowing what I do when I get there.
Two things people don’t know about me: (well, now you will).
– I don’t sleep next to walls or windows and have to be closest to the door. I think that comes under “irrational”? 😛
annd.. erm.. -mindblank-
Okay, just the one then 😛
Thanks for sharing this Havi. I love that I can come here and find the reassurance to be myself.
x
.-= Rose´s last post … Need to mend your wings =-.
I hit the submit button without intending do so but would like to add a couple of more things.
I don’t like going to sleep when the door of the warderobe or a drawer is open or ajar.
I always have a tooth brush with me. I cannot last a day from leaving the house to coming back without brushing my teeth inbetween.
I love to spend the first hour of the day in my pyjamas with a coffee in front of the computer.
I don’t survive well without very regular hermit intervals.
I totally identify with all the HSP and non-adventurous stuff that Havi mentions.
There is a brand of tractor called “Cockshutt” Makes me giggle every time there’s a parade around here (we like to parade our tractors, oh yes we do).
I painted popcorn cans for money when we lived in Texas.
I also was a wench at the Texas Renaissance Fair that year.
I can’t sit with my back to the door when we go out. I think I was mafia in a former life 😉
I used to tape cars for my dad so he could paint them.
I love the colors blue and orange together.
My favorite movie is The Trouble with Angels (Hayley Mills as a convent school girl in the early 60s)
I love drawing most of all, drawing’s my favorite 😀
.-= Andi´s last post … The Sketchbook Project- Week Two =-.
There IS something really attractive about this. Fun!
Two for me:
I can fall down in almost any creek I’m crossing–large, small, rocky, smooth, flowing or trickling. But that’s OK. I tell people I’ll go first because after I fall down, no one else has to feel embarrassed about it. And I still cross lots of creeks because I absolutely love hiking.
I pick up things on walks. Acorns, birds’ shells, stones. Someone once gave me a coat with what they called “a baby bird pocket” because I do this so much. Ironically, I would pretty much never pick up a baby bird and take it home, though.
OK, three, because I have guilty pleasures too. I like to read the programming description of movies on Lifetime or other soap-opera-ish movie channels. I don’t like to watch the movies themselves–I think the descriptions are like hilarious little short stories. “Sweet, kind woman moves to a picturesque small town to start a flower shop and discovers the devil’s baby is living in her petunia patch! Oh no!” Or some such. Makes me giggle.
It’s nice to be back here, by the way. Happy almost-autumn everyone.
.-= Elizabeth´s last post … Subscribe and Have Impulsia Delivered to Your Inbox! =-.
So much love, Havi.
I am very introverted but do not consider myself shy.
I have never wanted children of my own. It is a pleasure whenever I encounter others of like mind or willingness to respect my choices. Because while I am strong-minded enough not to take people seriously who consider me a selfish, self-deluding freak, I get weary of that reaction. Especially from people who can see that I am generally fiercely intentional about almost every other aspect of my life; it annoys the heck out of me that they can’t see the intentionality applies to my nonreproductive decisions as well.
(Leocadia: I have a copy of Beyond Motherhood as well.)
Some non-ranty things the people here might enjoy knowing about me? Hmm…
1 – When I began freelancing, I started out as a calligrapher.
2 – I’ve traded my lettering and cards for beer, books, bookshelves, and vegetables.
3 – One of my major reference-writing gigs (for the Oxford Encyclopedia of Children’s Literature) came about because I was exhibiting my calligraphy at a fantasy literature con whose vendors included the husband of one of the ECL’s contributing editors.
4 – I love to travel, but I’m also a major homebody. Trying to get me to leave my house once I shuck off my shoeses for the day (or if I haven’t put them on) — good luck!
5 – I’m not afraid of flying, but I hate it. I find it physically uncomfortable at the best of times, and as someone who’s had to contend with urge incontinence issues, I greatly dislike being trapped in any situation where access to a bathroom is at times difficult and outright forbidden during others.
6 – On the other hand, I’m one of the few people I know who likes O’Hare. I think it’s a beautiful airport; I like that I can catch the El from/to it; I’ve had good pedicures there.
7 – I’m a decent cook, and I like trying to work around my friends’ various dietary restrictions, but so far I have not been able to devise a Pesach-compliant version of bourbon balls.
Wishing everyone a good week!
.-= Mechaieh´s last post … Chicago Manual of Style =-.
I, too, am a fan of routine. Same restaurant, same food? Definitely.
This was fabulous.
.-= Julie´s last post … Monday roundup =-.
1. I can’t stand to have substances on my fingers. Even if I’m cooking. So, for example, if I eat Doritos (uncommon, but happens) I will wipe my fingers off after EVERY Dorito I put in my mouth.
2. I frequently have dreams where I know for certain I am dreaming. And sometimes, if I try really hard, I can wake myself up out of them. And while I do this I feel totally trapped in a paralyzed body. And it’s awful!
3. I like sushi but don’t eat it because food poisoning totally freaks me out. And even though I know I’ll probably be fine, if I do eat it I spend the next 12 hours hoping I don’t get sick.
4. I hate loud, surprizing noises. Like a car backfiring or a child just suddenly screaming in the middle of quiet restaurant. Totally puts me on edge!
5. I can watch a fire burn or listen to running water for hours. As if I were in a trance or something!
Happy Monday! 🙂
1. That thing you do in the cafe’s and places with the babies, I do with the dogs and the puppies. Not so much into the babies. I like their cuteness and their wise, unspoken knowing but their neediness freaks me to no end.
So yeah, if my grandmother asks me one more time when I’m having a grandchild because I really need to do it soon as I’m getting to the age where any babies I might have will have “problems” and I have to reply to her that MeMa – you’ve got gran-dog-ters and that’s all you’ll get from me.
So I’m there with you, sort of, on the reproducing front.
2. Do not tell me I can’t because you just insured that I will or at least will spend time looking at and for all the ways I can (except for the child bearing thing).
3. Anything coming at me quickly and seen with my peripheral vision = attack. Sadly this includes butterflies.
4. Completely floating face up, totally relaxed in water. The only stroke I am proficient in is the back stroke and I can’t tread water to save my life so, while I like being in water, I mostly sit and look at it.
5. I LOVE driving fast cars and the racetrack and drag racing. My heart is beating faster and I am smiling just even typing this. And I’ve ever been in one serious accident.
6. Once I find a meal I like somewhere, that is what I order. I am not menu adventurous.
7. I love voices, hearing them, listening to their lilting formation of syllables, the cadence. There are voices when I first hear them, I can’t listen to them for very long. I also like to make voices. I’m told I do a pretty decent Australian and I have the Savannah Belle down pat.
Dear Havi,
What a wonderful post, I really loved reading it, and particularly hearing about thing which you have given yourself permission to be ok with, even when society and programing say that it’s not ok. you are so, well, you – and just by your being that, you help me to be reminded, and feel like I have permission to be completely me. That is such an amazing gift for me. Thank you.
Ok a few things about me:
– I like swimming in pools, but rarely in natural bodies of water
– I have ongoing fantasies about being a conductor (of music, not on a train, though that would be fun too…)
– Even though I grew up within a couple of miles of the coast in New England and still live here, I’ve never liked seafood. People find it continually mysterious that I don’t like lobster.
– I enjoy cooking, and I’m quite good at it, but I almost never cook for myself.
-I’m so over the top crazy about Theater Pipe Organs and the music played on them that I wrote a blog post about it.
.-= Andy Dolph´s last post … Finding the Heart of My Business =-.
Oh the babies thing. Gah! I understand where people are coming from, and still… my life, my decision. Your life, your decision. What’s so hard about that? Diversity makes us stronger.
I could absolutely rant about this (and for people who don’t know: I have given birth to a small person, and am still an intelligent human being).
Things about me:
-I rarely get angry, but if you trigger my protective instincts I can’t predict what will happen.
-Chocolate sometimes makes me sneeze. I eat it anyway.
-I used to be more picky about food, and consciously, systematically started training myself to eat foods I didn’t like. Except for soda. I see no need to drink soda. Right now I’m working on melons.
-I want to visit all seven continents, and have three to go (though really, continents are too large a division).
One time I tried to make my own conditioner and it turned to glue when mixed with my hair + water. I felt actual terror that I might have to shave my head then and there, which, thank God, I did not.
I had to use shampoo for the first time in a year which was almost as devastating, but whatever–no glue!
I also cry during Avatar the Last Airbender (the cartoon!) on a somewhat regular basis and I think I have a crush on Uncle Iroh. Haven’t decided yet. He’s just so awesome, I don’t know if I can help myself.
Peace Havi…would love your conditioner recipe.
Ohhh, I love learning all of these things about Havi and the Chickeneers! I’ll forget them all of course (because that’s what I do) but I love learning them!
Ok, here’s a few from me.
Onions make me cry. No, not just the usual irritated-eye-tears when you cut them. Eating onions (especially on consecutive days) will send me on an end-of-the-world, inconsolable, “it will never be ok!” crying jag. Growing up with a mother who used onions like salt? Yeah. I spent my childhood bawling inexplicably.
Speaking of growing up, I grew up with a twin brother. No, it wasn’t neat – it just was. But yes, it shaped my view of the world, especially male-female relationships.
I hate being asked “So tell me about yourself?” I want you to discover me for yourself – a proper answer takes a lifetime, and I’m not all that easily abridged. There are no CliffNotes here.
Oh, and I love indulging in over-the-top disaster movies full of bad science, and I love snickering at pseudo-science in real life, too. It’s the wrongness. It rocks.
Dear Havi,
Thank you for this. I love that you have so much sovreignty about you. I can identify with so many things here, but I always second guess myself so much. I feel like I am always apologizing for every thing that is not the way everyone else would do it. Or at least feeling somewhat awkward.
I did however have an experience in which someone judged me for having views which were NOT homophobic or racist or anti-foreign. And so… I just had to laugh. And realize that there is always someone who may judge you no matter what you believe.
It’s so lovely being able to read so many interesting tidbits about everyone! I see so many things I can relate to, too.
Hmm, things about me…
-I get tongue-tied in regular conversation for no apparent reason and it takes 5 to 10 minutes before I can speak correctly again.
-I dread unfamiliar food and eateries. I become panic stricken when looking over menus with too many options.
-I’ve spent my entire life believing I wanted to make art my career instead of just a hobby. I’ve spent several months trying to set up an online business and sell my art. I got frustrated and slowly stopped creating any art at all. I feel so free and alive!
-I don’t know how to drive. I finally decided that I wanted to learn because I want to be able to get to the local animal shelter and volunteer. Very few things make me as happy as seeing doggies and being able to play with them.
-I understand dogs better than people. I can also communication with them better.
-When I get bored I play boardgames by myself.
Ooh, also – I often make silly typos by using the wrong form of the word I want, as seen above.
@Serena – oh yes, me too, about the weird desire to apologize for things when I want to just be able to state them. I have been working on that for a looong time and it still is a challenge. Thank you!
@Tori – ohmygod yes the “So tell me about yourself” question. Ugh. Tongue-tied and red-faced. And also diva-annoyed: like, have you not been spying on me? What do you know so far? Why are you making me talk about myself?
@Melissa – ooh, that reminded me of a 26th thing I could have shared: I have shaved my head twice. Once when I was nineteen and once when I was twenty nine. It was great.
Conditioner: I generally do egg + lemon juice + olive oil + drop of rosemary oil, very well mixed. There are all sorts of recipes (some people freak out about eggs so there are non-egg recipes but I’ve never tried one).
@Andy – how neat! Theater pipe organs!
@LaShae – awesome. I have all of yours, except the race cars and the southern belle, and now I’m completely intrigued about both of those. What a terrific list!
And yes, the tell me that I cannot do something and I will prove you wrong thing. That has definitely informed way too much of my life.
@Mechaieh – what a great list. I LOVE it. And if you figure out pesach bourbon balls, I have some people who would be *very* interested ….
@Amy – yes, let us declare that stopcock is eternally funny. Also, no one should be able to give you a Look when you’re laughing at it.
@Leocadia – that’s a great list too. I also cannot suppress sneezes. And I grew up in a family where everyone tried to sneeze the loudest so I also get freaked out when people do those tiny little blocked kerchoo sneezes.
These are wonderful!
This is so wonderful. And very entertaining.
Here’s my bits:
I have the tiniest bladder ever.
I used to date the ladies, but now I have a gentleman friend.
I hate touching gum wrappers, especially Big Red gum.
I can recite all the US presidents in order.
I dislike gossip but devour celebrity “news.”
I also don’t get the baby-making thing, but I DO have an intense maternal “instinct,” and will snuggle and care for any dependent being alive (mice and roaches excluded)
Thanks for letting us share!
Just a giant “heck yeah” to the whole giving birth to small people thing. The worst is “well, I didn’t want children either and now look” as they gesture to their small flock like they were showing me the view from an estate in Ireland. On the water.
Hoping that I will want them after they show up seems like a really bad thing to do.
I like to leave the child bearing to the people who know they want them.
And I shall sew small things for them.
However, every so often I have a day where I would like to lie with a baby on my chest while I sniff it’s head. But then I go to yoga class and feel better.
Here’s what I like: finding and following and reading your posts.
I always thought I was shy but have found that I am quite the extrovert. And I like it.
Love sitting in cafes and people watch/listen, whether they have babies or not.
Love the sound of sibilant words. Maybe I was a snake in another life.
Never liked to play with Ouija Board because a nun at my Catholic School once told us girls that we would open the door to the devil! I know it’s not true, but… 🙂
Even cry at movies when happy things happen.
And if you ever visit my place and don’t know what to comment just say, “Hey!”
.-= Marisa Birns´s last post … Full Circle =-.
It is so fun reading everyone’s things!
A few about me:
– I once broke my leg practicing roller derby in Boston. Haven’t skated since but I do have really cool scars where they put in metal to fix me up.
– I also despise the phrase “stop crying”!! It should be outlawed. And along with it, any variation on it’s just a little sting, you’ll hardly feel it, etc. These are very mean lies that doctors and nurses tell.
– My hair has been red, brown, purple, blue, pink and orange, but it is currently my natural color, blond.
– I have a wee baby and I STILL make squishy faces at other folks’ adorable babies, and at their puppies, even though I’m not sure I’d like another baby OR a puppy. Cute things are just cute. It’s good for the heart to look at them 🙂
Okay. Can’t think of any more interesting ones. But loving this peek into others’ lives 🙂
.-= Jesse´s last post … Friday check-in- Insert life here =-.
It’s lucky that Miss Havi and I never tried to meet a second time to eat. I will NEVER eat at the same place twice in a row, and NEVER have the same meal twice. Oopsie.
Some things you really don’t need to know about me, but will soon:
1. I have “perfect relative perfect pitch” — it’s not perfect pitch, put I can hear intervals perfectly. In grade school the band leader started having me tune autoharps, timpani, guitars and such by ear. Went on for the rest of my school years — I’m much faster than machines.
2. Think tickling is funny? Try tickling me. I’ll probably fling an arm so wildly an elbow will bruise you badly or break something. And I won’t apologize or laugh.
3. I have three siblings with wonderful children, and I grew up like Beaver Cleaver. But I don’t have children, don’t want children, and would like to find an airline that didn’t allow children. Yet I am a great uncle and/or babysitter.
4. At five years old, I created and sold my first newspaper in Greensburg, Kentucky. (Helped that my Aunt published an actual newspaper there.) 5 cents each.
5. I don’t do amusement park rides like roller coasters. I just don’t understand the idea of paying to be frightened — this applies to scary movies, surprise parties, and haunted houses.
.-= Dick Carlson´s last post … Learner Feedback You Can’t STAND Learner Feedback! =-.
I have kids. I love my kids. One kid got here by accident, and one kid was a momentary lapse in judgment. I am not such a fan of other people’s children.
The powers that be gave me really good kids, because they didn’t want me putting them in the free box.
Things people don’t know about me:
1. I have an acute sense of smell. Super-acute.
2. I am wet-wood phobic, especially if someone puts unsealed wood in their mouth, like say a wooden spoon or a popsicle stick or a toothpick. Ugh. Just thinking about it makes me go all acky. (also wet paper=icky)
3. I like vertebrae. I have a vertebrae from an unknown animal on my desk. Known animals might be creepier.
4. All my teeth are sweet.
5. I have a hard time talking about what I do for a living, unless I feel super-safe, and then I’ll talk your ear off.
6. I secretly think that most people don’t like me, even though I cognitively know that I’m pretty likable. Growing up Portland Weird in rural Minnesota will do that to a girl. It makes it hard to show up and be me sometimes, but I also know I’m really lousy at being anybody else, like way lousier, so I am brave and authentic, even when I’m sucky.
7. I like to stay home…a lot. And you have to really be a friend of mine to come over to my house.
.-= Bridget´s last post … How to Be Authentic in an Amplified State =-.
Oh, thank you for this! I’m especially enjoying the chance to learn a bit more about some of the other folks who spend time here.
A few random things about me:
–The smell of bananas makes me acutely nauseous. I have real difficulty being in the same room with them.
–I too am an introvert; I too am a HSP.
–I didn’t learn to drive until I was over 30. At first I just wasn’t interested, then I was a bit anxious and avoidant about it. When I eventually took the plunge, the thing that surprised me the most was how much I actually came to enjoy driving — the physical sensation, more than all that other stuff people told me I would like, such as the convenience and the independence.
–I love to travel through towns I’ve never seen before. The most mundane things in a town can be intriguing and exciting to me: new sights!
–My crushes on celebrities have seldom been on the ones that everyone around me was raving about, and never on the conventionally good-looking types. I have a soft spot for character actors and eccentrics.
–I love reading aloud to people. My daughter is well past the typical “read me a bedtime story, Mommy” age, but I still read to her at night; for that matter, I read to my partners, too. It gives me a terrific outlet for my passion for acting, and I get to play all the roles at once!
.-= Kathleen Avins´s last post … It was bound to happen =-.
A few weirdo things about me:
1. I can’t stand to look at people if they have food on their faces/shirts and won’t wipe it off. AIYEEEE!
2. I hate stickers, labels, price tags, etc. on things I’ve purchased (wastebaskets, scrub brushes, desk items, anything really) and so I immediately remove all of them. Even if it’s on the bottom of the item and not visible. Even if it will probably damage the thing to take the label off. If I’m at a friend’s house I will offer to take the stickers off of stuff for them too.
3. From working with book repair/restoration years ago, I can take stickers and labels and ink and tape and marks off of anything paper. I have ten favorite brands of erasers all for different kinds of marks.
4. I really love cool shoes, but I also go barefoot whenever possible.
5. I’m never really interested when people bring their grandbabies into the office to show them off. They’re nice, but they’re just cute babies. But if someone brought in a basket of KITTENS, that would be the best day EVER in the history of the planet. You know? I freak out just *imagining* how great that would be.
Havi,
Thank you (and thanks to the other commenters) very much for this. It’s good for me to hear that there are other women who don’t have children AND ARE HAPPY WITH THINGS THAT WAY.
A few things about me:
1. I have a small tiny phobia about stepping onto a down escalator.
2. I used to hate eggs. Now I have at least one a day.
3. (for @Lindsay): I use chopsticks to eat Cheetos. Learned the trick from a friend.
4. I have trouble allowing myself to enjoy something.
5. Turning 35 did wonders for my sovereignty. (Or should that be the other way round? My sovereignty did wonders for my turning 35?)
6. I’m a vegetarian, but I make the rules, I break the rules.
7. I don’t have any piercings. At all. Not even on my earlobes.
Wow, just reading all of these things makes me feel better. Whee! What a bunch of weirdos we all are! Yay for us!
Some of my things:
– Dogs yes, babies no. Goats and horses make my day!
– Like Bridget, I have a super-keen sense of smell. To me, perfume is just as bad as diesel fumes. The faintest whiff of turpentine gives me vertigo.
– I’m highly introverted, but I can talk to strangers all day if I have to. (Sometimes I have to.) Then I go home and take a nap.
– I make all my own soap. (But I buy shampoo and conditioner.)
.-= Barbara J Carter´s last post … New dot painting- “Mandala” =-.
@Melissa – Iroh is my favorite character too. He’s so AWESOME!
This is such a great post, Havi! I love reading the comments, too. I may do a a similar post over on my own blog. In the meantime, here are a few things of my own:
– I don’t hate kids or want to eat them or something, I’m phobic of (about? to? whatever) them. They freak me out. Kind of like spiders freak out arachnophobes.
– I love starting new things more than just about anything else (classes, books, journals, websites…), which is why I am horribly overbooked and have trouble finishing things.
– Independent bookstores (especially ones that carry used books) have my favorite smell ever. Heaven smells like a bookshop, I am convinced.
.-= Ealasaid´s last post … Failbender- Rant the Second! Mythology fail- racefail- and genderfail =-.
This is addictive.
@Bonni – a basket of kitten at work – totally the best day ever at work for me too.
I need to be able to see out a window. I have left a job because the three month training took place in a basement room with slivers of windows right at the top of the walls. Horrible.
I pine for the sea if I go more than a couple of weeks without spending time by it. (Effect of growing up a five minute walk from the beach.)
At one point I have studied these languages: French, German, Italian, Latin, ancient Greek, Mandarin. The only one I’ve come close to fluency in is French. Language dilletante.
These are all great!
– I went though a period about 12 years ago where I was really, really ready to have a kid, but my situation at the time was not conducive to making that happen. I love kids, but I’m over the need to have one of my own now. I’m too set in my ways and used to my “me” time. I love being an aunt, though.
– I cry easily, not only when I’m sad, but also when I’m angry or frustrated. The worst thing anyone can do in that situation is tell me to stop crying or make a fuss over me. Just let it run its course.
– I don’t mind going places by myself, whether it’s the movies, a restaurant, the zoo, whatever. I savor those days when I can just wander around and be inside my own head.
– I think I used up all my love of talking on the phone in high school. These days, I avoid phone conversations as much as possible.
.-= Lori Paximadis´s last post … Friday Really =-.
Wow. Funny that after all the great posts you’ve written on this exact point, of being sovereign and giving yourself permission and all of it—*this* is the one that blows the doors open. Awesome. Lots of thanks.
@Lindsay, @Pat: I use a spoon to eat Cheetos-like chips. It takes so long to get the cheesiness off that I needed a better solution. 🙂
.-= Elizabeth´s last post … ode to joy- volume 32 =-.
Yes, thank you, yes, it is OK to not want to have a baby. Even if you have a uterus. I have a uterus. No babies. This is one of the good things about my life.
Hmm… so we’re listing weirdnesses? Or quirks? Or shareable unusualities? Hm, I don’t know.
I like spreadsheets. Creating them brings me joy. I’m terrible at mental arithmatic though, and these two may be related.
I have a secret second life which exists only in my head, which has featured the same main character for over 10 years now. Supporting cast and circumstances change, and I play different roles at times, but the central character is always the same.
I am fascinated by disgusting things. Like zombies and horrible squelchy ookie stuff. It’s not that I don’t find it disgusting, it just also pokes a weird obsessive pleasure button in my brain. Much time wasted on the internet as a result.
It’s fun to read people’s things. ^__^ Well done to anyone who read this far though. XD
.-= Williemonster Hewes´s last post … How to Make a Mini-Monster Journal =-.
Great post and fun answers as well!
3 quick ones from me:
I love sardines. I have to keep this on the d/l since my wife is not really cool with the strong smell when opening a can of fish.
I think my favorite thing to do is to eat elaborate meals with decent people long into the night. New friends or old, doesn’t really matter.
I had braces twice. My teeth are still f-ed up. I also had a “partial ocluder” when I was little which is basically an eye patch. You’d assume this might be perceived as cool, but… you’d be wrong.
.-= Scott McDowell´s last post … Turning Towards the Red Hot Center =-.
Two I’ve been thinking about lately:
1. If I had it to do over again, I wouldn’t bother finishing high school. At the time it seemed important, and in retrospect, it’s the least important hoop I ever jumped through. I’ve been trying to remember this as I poke at other things I want to learn now–skip the certificate, just take the classes that look interesting or find a study group. (The B.A. was worth it, though.)
2. I seem to have arranged most of my life around having as much time as I want to work on computer things while wearing pajamas. It makes me happy, so I guess this works. (Maybe I can call this my optimal environment? Pajamas, computer things, cats, tea.)
I’m a water person too. Near water, in water, swimming, boating, anything like that.
.-= Audrey´s last post … Puppy! http-flickr-p-8sBiJ1 =-.
@lindsay: I refuse to eat Doritos, Cheetos or really any artificial-cheese-covered food for exactly that reason.
Some things you might not know about me:
1. I do not have a favorite color. I hate it when people ask, because I just don’t know. All of the above.
2. I am afraid of elevators, especially when there are more than three people on them. I used to work downtown on the 35th floor, and would get on and off of elevators until they met my requirements. People thought I was strange.
3. When they cut me open to take the Little Bird out of my uterus, I asked if I could watch in a mirror. (They said no.) I have a macabre fascination with what I look like under my skin. I really want to know what my skull looks like especially, but I guess I’ll never have that privilege. At the same time, other people’s blood makes me woozy.
4. I have been playing scrabble online with my older sister continually for the past two years. As soon as one game ends, we start another. We’re pretty much evenly matched, but she gets the best bingos.
5. I feel about religion the same way I do about color.
.-= Emily´s last post … Nightfall Stole =-.
A few things about me…
I used to worry about not having a motherly instinct towards children until I read a collection of essays called “Nobody’s Mother,” which renewed my faith in following my own path. I tend to prefer animals and think children are cutest when I think of them as tiny primates (this stems from the dream of becoming a primatologist and being generally enthralled by primates). I have never planned my own wedding, much to the shock of some of my co-workers.
Although my mother was a nurse and my father was a mountain climber, I have a fear of both needles and heights.
I’m currently stuckified because I had planned to pursue my Master’s and PhD in primatology for years, but have recently found out that the field is so small, specialized, and competitive that I would have a difficult time finding a job. And so now I am trying to start up my Agents of Karma Etsy business while baking cupcakes as my day job AND I’m trying to find out what other career to pursue, if not silkscreening as an Etsy artisan. Thus, I am a beloved lurker at 2:30 AM with my coffee when I have to get up to get ready to bake at 4AM. I find myself torn between the optimistic-but-muchly-shunned-by-other-people’s “Follow your dreams!” and the pragmatic-but-disheartening “For heaven’s sake find a job that pays all your bills regardless of whether it makes you happy. CAREER, CAREER!”
I love that my Boson Terrier snores as loud as I do and, though I like the thought of people, in practice I find myself repelled by many individuals – mostly loud, obnoxious, self-centered people who are disrespectful of others. I do love random encounters in coffee shops and people watching, I enjoy random acts of kindness, and yes, I do believe in karma.
Thanks for the chance to share, I needed that.
-Frequent lurker and espouser of Havi-isms
.-= Shelley´s last post … Living Creatively =-.
bOh, I didn’t think I had anything (at least anything that, you, havi, didn’t already figure out while staying in my only cat-free room)…until I read other commenters.
1. I only curse when I’m not THAT upset.
I was raised not to and so now I can only do it *really* consciously. It never just pops out in a moment of pain or anger. I mostly curse while talking about something that already happened, just to add color.
2. I don’t know why I have pink hair.
I just felt like doing it. And then, when it fades, I feel like re-doing it. Every month for a year.
When people ask I say “because I want to”. But I don’t really have a reason. And I don’t think I need one.
3. I like having divorced parents.
I think if they would have stayed together I’d be REALLY messed up. Plus, I got a fantastic step-mother out of the deal. SCORE!
4. Since we’re all talking about babies: they speak to me.
No matter where I am in relation to the baby, he will turn his head (even if he’s too young to lift his head!) and stare directly at me. As long as I’m in the room, he won’t look away.
This has ALWAYS been true, since I was a kid myself.
And it’s not in my mind (although if it was, I know ya’ll would be cool with it)…it creeps out parents, especially when I mention that I’m mindmelding with their spawn.
5. I can’t step on an escalator without holding someone’s hand.
It’s rational!
6. After years of flirting with the idea, I suddenly became a vegetarian this January.
I suppose I have my reasons, but I haven’t thought about it since.
And…I think that’s enough for now!
.-= Tara´s last post … Shannon is crafting a publishing business =-.
I can relate to a lot of what has been mentioned here, both in the post and the comments! I’ll try not to repeat those and instead find a few different things…
– Well, if that wasn’t clear from what I’ve just said, I have a tendency to think that I “should” be original. That’s not useful. As if I hadn’t completely internalized yet that being me is just fine.
– I love learning languages. French is my first language, I speak English as a second language, I’ve learned some Spanish and German in school, and picked up bits of Georgian in an ethnolinguistics class. The one I now consider my third language (in terms of my ability to use it) is Farsi, which I have learned with Iranian friends here and also at the University of Esfahan, Iran.
– I have a degree in Anthropology, with specialization in Ethnolinguistics: I don’t think something more perfect for me and my love of languages, cultures, and the relationships between them could be found. 🙂
– I realized lately that I am an autodidact at heart. I love learning, and though I did well in school by external standards, the school system as I’ve known it wasn’t a good environment for me (the negative effect it’s had on my personality is also a relatively recent realization – oh, and it may have something to do with the first item I put up there…).
– I love sharing knowledge and helping people learn as much as I love learning, and just like I do with my learning, I want to do this knowledge sharing in non-conventional ways and settings. I guess there are people who need that, right? So that’s a way to look at what I want to do. Oh, that was interesting to put this into words in this way! That is useful! 🙂
I’m incredibly afraid of slugs. And anything that reminds me of slugs. I even have a list of how things are slug-like.
Snails = slugs with shells
Leaches = slugs that drink blood
Worms = slugs that live underground
I have weird and awesome abilities to train animals. I have trained various skills into cockatiels, love birds, rabbits, cats, ferrets and dogs.
I’ve known since I was 12 how I felt about making little people. This seems to make people more inclined to doubt my decision. It really just happens to be one thing in life that I have never been confused about how I felt about the subject. So glad to see so many other like minded peoples about here.
*lurk, lurk* WAVE!
(also, not much for the commenting.)
Hmm, okay.
1) I’m an extrovert, actually — just an INTENSELY awkward one. I’m in the habit of apologizing for my awkwardness, but actually the more I expose people to it the more I see that they actually kind of like it. I have the ability to make other people feel more okay with their own awkwardness. How great is that?
2) I’m not a non-driver, I’m an expert bus-navigator and walker.
3) I’m not an anxiety sufferer, I’m an expert on getting through panic attacks.
4) When I was a young teen and wanted to get in touch with my spirituality, I found that my then-undiagnosed anxiety made it completely counterproductive to sit in one place and meditate. So I’d just dance by myself instead. I can meditate if I want to now, but I still kind of prefer the dancing.
This is a fantastic post… something like sleepovers where you wind up spilling all these details about yourselves and have a “band of brothers” type bonding. 🙂
I’ll throw my hat in with a weird one I never tell anybody. I am phobic about balloons. If I walk into a store and see a kid walking around with one, it’s all I can do not to walk out. Worse, even, when there’s somebody filling balloons. My fingers then creep toward my ears — I can’t help myself. It actually makes my skin crawl, waiting for the damned things to pop.
And a baby BITING on a balloon? Want. To. Die. Then I leave no matter what.
Sorry that I am commenting a third time. Havi, this post was such an awesome idea (as you can tell by the number of comments). In about 85% of what all of you guys have put down I detect at least one thing I totally relate to and that I didn’t think of when I pondered about what to put on my list. Like (@ Pat) “tiny phobia of stepping onto a down escalator” – yeah, I have that, too, or (@Dawn) no, it is me who has the tiniest bladder ever! And tons of other stuff. The post and comments really make me laugh and give me food for thought. And great to hear that I am not alone with the “I don’t want children -issue”.
Thanks everyone for sharing your stuff, this post really made my day.
*Ready to go to bed soon with a smile on her face*
I’ve had such a blast reading each and every one of these posts. Being weird little earthlings is so awesome.
1. I also have no desire to produce smaller people. Lately I find it a romantic notion for about 2 or 3 days a month – but, really, what would I do with the kid for the other 27 days of the month?
2. I have a phobia of falling UP the stairs and smashing my teeth. I often have to cover my mouth when walking up stairs.
3. I once paid to jump out of an airplane and my parachute didn’t open.
4. I enjoy seeing how many potato chips I can fit in my mouth at once. I don’t see the point in eating one at a time.
5. I loooove getting mail – email, mail…whatever. It is my current raison d’etre.
6. My favorite word is indubitably
7. I like dolls more than people
8. I believe that I am a cartoon
I have very specific food related “things” — sorta rules but only for me.
I’m 36 and I have NO idea what I want to do with my life — other than be a mother (I have 2 kids already and would love to have another… and I can’t explain why to you, but to me its a GLOW-sparkle-warmth feeling, the ONLY thing I have ever known was “RIGHT” in my life)…
I have 2 bachelor degrees — psychology and production/operations management — and yet I work as a receptionist/administrator and don’t use either degree.
I never felt like I fit in with anyone…
Like you, I LIKE being divorced.
.-= Pam´s last post … Wishcasting Wednesday- What do you wish to send love to =-.