Random Things

I keep thinking of good subjects for blog posts. Then I forget what it was I was going to write about. So, instead, I'm going to answer one of those random questionnaires. The kind that go around Facebook. This particular one simply asks for 15 random facts. Simple enough. I promise to try to be as absolutely random with these facts as I POSSIBLY can. None of this "My favorite color is cerulean" crap. Which it is, by the way.

1. When I was a little girl and my Granny passed away, my family once caught me standing alone in the middle of a field waving up at the sky. When asked what I was doing, my response was, "Oh, just waving to God and Granny". I also still remember talking to my Granny at the chain link fence in Kindergarten - I would ask God to go and get her for me, then I'd wait a minute, then I'd tell her all about my day. I can't really remember my Granny, but I remember this, and it's my proof that she was my best friend in the whole world. I still talk to her, sometimes, and I still think it's amazing that a woman I only knew for the first 3.5 years of my life has had such a profound impact on me. She is my biggest role model, although all I really have to aspire to are stories of her and a strong physical resemblance.

2. June Bugs are the only creatures I think I've ever been intentionally cruel to. I just hate them so much, and I always have. I would catch them eating our rose bushes and pull their legs and wings off. One flew in my hair while I was sleeping as a child; I'm pretty sure this had something to do with my immense hatred for them. The only other bugs I really, really can't stand are cicadas (locally called locust), and that's more terror than hatred.

3. Apparently there was an Amanda Phillips who got married on September 25th of last year. She also registered at Bed, Bath, and Beyond. This has apparently caused some confusion for some of our wedding guests...most notably my mother, who wondered why the heck we'd registered for beer mugs.

4. I was a dancer for 18 solid years of my life, from the age of 2 to the age of 20. I haven't really danced, other than the occasional number in a musical, since I was 20. On Monday, I will become a ballet teacher for three different ballet classes, ages 3-4. Somehow, even with 18 years of ballet behind me, that 5 year gap has made me utterly terrified of this new development.

5. I really think that everyone has more diverse interests than we give them credit for, and that you can't tell what people like and dislike just by what "type" they fit. However, I also really and truly believe that I have more diverse interests than anyone else I have ever met. I spent a few unhappy months of my life trying to figure out exactly what mold I best belonged in, and I only ended up frustrated. I think there are plenty of people who just don't fit a mold...my problem is I fit so MANY molds. I finally decided to say 'screw it' and now I choose to step into whatever mold I like best at the time. Hence the title of this blog.

6. I have an inexplicable attraction to plump, redheaded women. I really don't know quite where this started. This is not to say that I have the hots for every plump redhead in the world; actually, I would classify myself as at least 95% straight, but I think anyone who thinks they are 100% straight is in complete denial. However, of the women that I am/have been attracted to, whether in real life or on the screen, nearly ALL of them have been plump redheads. I also have a desire to BE a plump, middle-aged redhead. I'm not really sure if the desire to be one fuels my attraction to them, or if it's vice-versa. All I know is, I'm deeply in love with Molly Weasley, Mrs. Paroo from the newest version of The Music Man, the Unsinkable Molly Brown from Titanic, and my third-grade friend Mary's mother.

7. Along the lines of the 'mold' idea...I have never truly decided what it is I want to be. I mean, the thing I MOST want to be is an actress...but I'm happy to do that in a community theatre setting, just so long as I still get to act. But as far as a career? Again, it's not that I can't find what I want to do...I just want to do so many things, I can't settle on one. I love teaching right now, but I still want to bartend. I want to run a bakery. I want to be a veterinary technician. I want to be a private nanny. I want to work as a receptionist. I've already waited tables, house managed a theatre, been a church secretary, and worked in a library. I want to do all those things again, too. Unfortunately, this is no way to make a living. Even MORE unfortunately...Scott is the same way. We're both happy to work any job (although I'm pickier than he is) and we can't settle on any one thing we want to do. However, I think if I could get a job teaching drama in a regular classroom...that'd probably make me happiest. Good thing that's what I went to school for.

8. I really and truly love the musical Cats. And I can't really and truly explain WHY, exactly. With Cats...you either love it, or you don't. If you love it, it's incredibly hard to put into words what's so special about it. But something about the show actually speaks to me, as hokey as that sounds, and the few times I've seen it live, I've been so excited that I've been on the edge of my seat bouncing up and down with tears in my eyes as soon as the overture began. It's an easy musical to make fun of because the fans can be so fanatic, and fanatics are always easy targets. But I will still defend it ever chance I get, even if my defense is simply "Shut up, it's my favorite show".

9. Along the same lines, I really love The Rocky Horror Show/The Rocky Horror Picture Show. It's not the same level of love, and honestly, I don't love it as much as I once did. But most people love RHPS for the spectacle of the live show, for the rice and the water guns and the shouting at the screen. That's fun, and I love it. But not as many people love the movie just for itself, and I really do.

10. For as long as I can remember, I've wanted children. I mean LITERALLY for as long as I can remember. I've been fascinated by babies and pregnancy since I was about 2. People tease me a lot about loving babies so much, and how I'm going to end up pregnant as soon as I'm married...but honestly, if it were just up to me, we really WOULD be having children immediately. It's not practical, no. We don't have the money. We should wait a few years and enjoy married life as a couple first. I know all of these things. People tell me these things constantly, and I always smile and agree with them and say that of course we're going to wait a couple of years. But the truth is, my whole greater purpose in life is to be a mother, and that's the one thing I've always, ALWAYS been sure of. Even when I doubt my abilities as an actress, or my intelligence, or my choices, or anything else that could possibly be doubted about my life and my reason for being here, I have never once doubted that I am supposed to be a mother.

Good grief, this is long. Screw writing 15 things. 10 is enough. I'll make up for it by posting a poem. When I was 11, my poems were really great. I was the best poet in the class, and even had other kids begging me to help them with their poetry assignments. Unfortunately, my abilities as a poet never progressed beyond that of an 11 year old. But I do still dabble.

Simile

sometimes driving down the highway
i wonder where this poetry is
the kind that's supposedly inside me
in this so-called dramatic soul
and all that comes to me are similes
captured old cliches that ring
so prettily in my head
the way the mist twines through the landscape
like a woman's hair through a lover's fingers
or how the street lights shine on a lonely highway
like silver
or how the moon hits your eye
like a big pizza pie
(i never understood that one)
wherefore, romeo, do we relate by comparison?
why does one thing always have to be like some other thing?
i am sure there's some scientific sociological answer
but i don't care much for science
and wouldn't it be nice
to stand on your own
and be like nothing else?