I’ve been tagged again! This time, I got tagged twice on the same game. Rina of Into Still Waters and my friend, Rachel, on Facebook both tagged me in a meme that requires that I write 25 random things about myself. Then I’m supposed to tag 25 other people. I suppose this might be easy for the people on Facebook with 4097 “friends,” but I’m not anywhere near that popular. I’ve been on Facebook for less than a month and haven’t even made it to 40 friends, let alone 4097. So instead of choosing people to tag, it would be almost like I was choosing people not to tag. I finally decided that it would be fun to just throw the game out there and see if anyone would like to play. I’ll list 25 random things about myself. And if you’d like to do the same on your blog, just leave the url in the comments section. I’d love to know more about any and all of you, but as I always say when I play games like these, there is absolutely no pressure!
So, without further ado, here are 25 random things about me.
1. Even though, I’m a homeschool graduate, I am terrible at spelling. (You see how useless stereotypes can be?) I don’t blame my dear mother, though. By the time she took me out of public school at the beginning of sixth grade, I was already rather, shall we say, free-spirited and creative in the spelling department. I actually improved some once my mom started teaching me.
2. Thanks, in part, to the blessing of spell-checkers, I have a Bachelors from Stanford in linguistics with a double concentration on narrative structure and language acquisition.
3. I know enough to find my way around some in French and Hebrew. (A linguistics major thinks twice before she says she “speaks” anything but her native tongue, and anyway, I haven’t really used either language in years, so I’m as rusty as a ten-year-old car in the road salt-encrusted Midwest.)
4. I am chronically behind on my laundry. But I’m trying to improve!
5. I own an M4. I asked for it for Christmas. I haven’t shot it yet because I’m pregnant, and I don’t shoot when I’m pregnant because I’m worried it’s too loud for the baby’s ears. I got my rifle because it has all the features that were banned under the Clinton era assault weapons ban (you know, a collapsible butt stock, bayonet lug, pistol grip, high-capacity magazine, flash suppressor–anything with more than two of these features was given the scary term, “assault weapon,” which most people associate with military machine guns, even though in most states civilians only owned semi-auto versions). Since Joe Biden was the original author of the ban, Mr. Parunak and I thought something similar might go into effect again. If you already own a gun with banned features, it gets grandfathered in and becomes extremely valuable. So it’s sort of an investment…and a conversation piece. And I could take it hunting if we were ever starving or something. Otherwise, it looks cool, when it’s not locked up, which it is most of the time.
6. I don’t have a favorite color. I love so many different colors, it’s impossible to choose. Multiple shades of green, blue, purple, and pink are all in the running.
7. I helped pay for community college by teaching ballet and leading discussion groups for prospective nursing students who were taking their chemistry prerequisite.
8. I eat way too much chocolate.
9. I’m afraid of heights. (This is especially a bummer because my husband is an avid rock climber, and it sure would be nice to be able to share his hobby. I stand at the base of the wall, though, take lots of pictures, and cheer him on.)
10. When I exercise, I often wear one of two Big Family Shirts my husband bought for me. One says, “Yes, my hands are full…and I love it,” and the other one says “Militant Fecundity.”
11. I love long walks, along dirt roads, through the farm land our subdivision boarders.
12. My favorite “job” at home is homeschooling my children.
13. I was a candy striper in in a maternity ward in high school.
14. When I was eleven (almost twelve), my mom gave me the amazing gift of letting me witness my brother’s birth. I was awestruck, mesmerized, fascinated. The obstetrician, afraid I might be freaked out by the pain my mom was in, tried to reassure me that by the time I was having babies, doctors would have figured out how to make it painless. I nodded politely. I was already dreaming of trying for natural births. So far, I’ve been very thankful to have been able to have three at home with essentially no interventions or medications.
15. I fantasize about having a family cow and chickens.
16. I met my husband just before my fifteenth birthday. He had just turned sixteen. We figured out by about a month later that we wanted to get married. But it took seven long years of letters and visiting each other’s families before we had finished school. By two weeks after my college graduation we were married.
17. Before we were married, my husband wrote me a song about Jacob and Rachel who also had to wait seven years to get married.
18. I don’t recommend waiting seven years to get married.
19. I am a morning person.
20. I love baking.
21. I don’t like coffee, even fancy coffee that has way more sugar, cream, and syrup than actual coffee.
22. Our dog went deaf after a round of doggie vaccines. Apparently, Cavalier King Charles Spaniels are prone to vaccinosis. The things you find out the hard way.
23. My husband and I were wedding photographers together for a couple years back when we only had one baby. Once our second was born, I retired, and he continued without me for a while, but has finally restricted his work to just friends so that he has more time with our family.
24. The job I had to help pay for the university half of my college experience was in Stanford’s government documents library. I started out as a shelf reader. That meant that I went down the shelf reading every call number, looking for documents that were in the wrong place. Can you believe I loved it?! It was so peaceful, and dark, and quiet back in the stacks, and I felt like I was on such a noble mission–restoring order, making it possible for people to find things they needed.
25. I love living in a place with seasons. (I grew up in the Willamette valley in Oregon, where we had two seasons: wet and less wet.) I celebrate the changes in Michigan with different knick knacks, candles, hand towels, etc. for different times of year. “Changing the decorations” is a favorite activity for my children and me.