101 things of solitudinousness
(this exercise has brought up some happy and sad memories i have not thought about for a while...) thank you boogie for the idea...
1. i have considered going by the name Elise, my middle name, upon moving to a new city - but forgot until i was introduced to too many people with my real first name.
2. i plan to change the spelling of my first name when i change my last name - perhaps then i will not only stop getting mail addressed to Mr. Jon A but people will actually pronounce it correctly? i doubt it.
3. i had an imaginary friend who would meet me after school behind the grocery - his name was Kume and he was an egyptian ghost of a young pharaoh who was trapped in limbo - i would complete tasks which led to his eventual release from the back grocery lot. after his release i continued to look for him for months behind the store, calling his name and such. he never returned.
4. the first thing i remember writing was the phrase i hate you over and over on paper which i would then fold into airplanes - there was an open ventilation duct that went from my bedroom upstairs down into the pantry in which i would fly the airplanes, hoping my parents would see them falling from the kitchen and come get my message. after a while they stopped fetching them and they would just pile up on the floor, ignored.
5. i think of myself as a grrl rather than as a woman. women are creepy.
6. i tend to tell my friends that i love them, sometimes over the phone which seems to weird them out a bit, but screw it.
7. i once rescued a chinese quail from our senior biology class (the teacher was planning to break all of their necks - the purpose of their lives only to incubate and hatch it seems) - i named it Aristotle and when i came into the room it would fly as well as it could out of its box to where i sat on the bed...and then snuggle with me. i starved it to death by accident by not giving it gravel to help digest the seed i fed it.
8. i used to introduce myself to others by biting them first and talking second.
9. i loved to read charlie brown comic books when i was little - there was something about snoopy's happy suppertime dance that made me smile every time - it still does.
10. when i was around nine i found a huge box of romance novels under my oldest sister's bed. my favorite was the FanClub, it made me hot.
11. i would mark the pages of my favorite parts of the book and share them with a friend of mine. two horny little girls we were.
12. tt bought me the hardback version of the FanClub a few years ago as a surprise, for i had not seen it since i was discovered and the books taken away...it still turned me on. a lot.
13. i was bored and not-inspired with school until college - i was teachers pet when younger and was both rudolf and the american flag in various plays or presentations - shortly after: the whole school, aside from merrydeath, took to teasing and beating me up after school.
14. i have been in love five times...every time before the last i believed i had found someone who loved me for who i am - but at those points i had no idea.
15. i am not sure now of who i am, but whoever that is, tt loves me hard and true.
16. i still fear abandonment and the void it would leave.
17. out of the four previous love relationships, i have broken up three of them - the other i left quite unwillingly but understand now that it was a good move to say the least.
18. i can wiggle my nose from side to side, bunny style and flare my nostrils - now that is a talented nose. i have never met someone else who can do all three.
19. i have a gold and bronze medal from the connecticut state games for ballroom dancing.
20. i won a scholarship in high school for writing an essay i wrote with the specific purpose of being so incredibly sappy i could not possibly win...it was about comparing high school life to climbing a long ladder, and helping others up it as you climbed...yuck, uck. but i won, which was terribly funny. once again, everyone hated me for it.
21. the same night i won the scholarship, i lost my virginity. i was 17.
22. my dad caught my first boyfriend and i having sex once - he offered to not tell his parents or my mother if we promised to never do it again. we promised. we lied. he never told the other parents.
23. i used to ask my mother if i ever had a twin or another sibling. until i was 23 she said no. once i graduated from college she told me (first and then my older sisters afterward) that she had an illegitimate son before she was married to my dad, who i grew up calling cousin. my cousin strangely enough was born before my mum knew my dad, but has the same name.
24. i had very few, if any (at times,) friends growing up - i befriended the family dogs instead. i used to beg them to talk to me for in my heart i knew they could, they just refused to.
25. i was known to paint the female dog's toenails with nail polish - she would tap around the house, purple nailed.
26. i have a strange fascination for all things that are the color of skin - cars, carts, books, clothes - which approaches the point of utter revulsion. i actually like skin-colored nail polish though - makes one look like a mannequin, fun!
27. i greatly dislike putting a fork with bent tines in my mouth...running it over my lips disturbs me on some deep level i do not understand.
28. i freak out about money, a lot, and often refuse to buy myself even the most rudimentary things (hair clips, chapstick, etc.) in order to not spend.
29. i am much more likely to buy friends or tt special presents or dinner rather than myself.
30. 1/5 of every paycheck goes in to savings, no exceptions.
31. i tend to be anxious and obsess easily about almost any situation, usually dealing with my interactions with others, and have great difficulty letting go of these feelings which usually lead to states of panic.
32. i may be a bit fucked up now, but i was much worse four years ago - just before i met tt.
33. i was institutionalized twice. while it was a good break from the stress/pressures of daily life i was mostly too doped up to actually accomplish any healing.
34. i called up my mummy and daddy to rescue me from boston before it happened again. they drove the 10 hours up to where i lived the next day, and in two days i was packed and gone.
35. i believe the decision to stop/change everything not only saved my life, but was best for all involved. this is the one thing that i feel most proud about.
36. i believe i do know how hard it can be, i do know how bad it gets, and i do believe people need to help themselves - and they can.
37. i get frustrated with people who will not do anything to improve their situation - but i try to understand that i was there for a while too.
38. i fear therapy. i believe it is a good thing, but tends to be very difficult to go through - few things that deal so intimately with ones mind are not.
39. i have only had one large group of friends and i will forever feel gratitude toward the grrlie who introduced me to them all.
40. i have lost three very good friends over the years due to emotional differences. there are things about this that i regret and would change if i had the opportunity, but it is most likely for the best and less painful to just let them go.
41. i still love and miss them.
42. my favorite packed lunch when i was little was artichokes with hollandaise sauce - second was stuffed peppers. i was jealous of the kids who ate school lunches every day because that seemed to be cooler than mine, but i can appreciate the lunches my mother packed now, fully.
43. my father was rarely awake when home, and was rarely home anyway - spending most of his time at bars. he once introduced me to his bar buddies and i almost threw up on them, immediately.
44. my mother was angry and disappointed in how her life turned out - trapping my dad into marriage with pregnancy 5 mo. into their relationship, and then not having the ideal family she had hoped for.
45. i grew up looking for love from my parents, a love that resembled other friend's families. i am still looking.
46. one of the things i dislike most is disappointment - when others do not do what they said they were going to do. i try to live up to what i say and am hard on myself when unable to.
47. i have very high standards for friends, and even higher for lovers. this often makes me more upset than i need to be - i make up things to worry about.
48. my body usually relaxes long before my mind, which has been known to keep me up or wake me up in the middle of the night.
49. our bed is sacred and comforting - two essentials for a poor sleeper. i am likely to try desperately to find ways to get home before crashing at someone else's house.
50. i find most of my friends attractive.
51. i would consider myself an inward letch. i may not act on anything i think, but i still think it.
52. tt and i often make up little lecherous stories and/or fantasies about everyone and anyone. we have fun talks about such things.
53. tt and i want to have more fun with others, but are mostly too shy to ever do anything.
54. i have no preference as to the sex of someone i have a crush on. tt does. i feel this may, in time, either loosen up or become a limitation.
55. i have been afraid of horses ever since i was thrown - ouch - but i still tend to want to ride.
56. i am very protective of myself. there are many things i am too afraid to do, but if i am certain it is safe, i will at least try.
57. i have a fear of stairs, and when on them always think of the possibility of falling and hitting my teeth off of them, and breaking my teeth.
58. i fell down the stairs a bunch when young. i never broke my teeth, but once cracked an ankle bone.
59. after 8 years of limping, i finally had surgery to fix the cracked ankle. around the same time i had two more surgeries requiring me to be under anesthesia. i have since had three more - for a total of six times being under the knife...one with only local anesthesia.
60. two of the surgeries were to fix one of the first three, a breast reduction, leaving my chest and breasts much more scar-ed than was agreed upon in the beginning.
61. i had my nipples pierced so i could feel less embarrassed to have people see them.
62. i have a fascination for insects but have recently made an unconscious decision to stop eating them. the list of insects i will not eat includes: scorpions, crabs, spiders, shrimp, snails, ants and lobsters.
63. i grew up in a haunted house - my friends and i would hold s�ances to try to communicate with the spirits. we had more interaction than expected. my mother admits she has seen a young blonde-haired boy a few times crying in the corners of different rooms.
64. i have smelled my own flesh burning � it smelled like steak.
65. i have 4 tattoos, three of which are on parts of my body i found unattractive before.
66. i plan on getting stocking lines tattooed up the backs of my legs.
67. i very much dislike eating anything off of the bone.
68. my sister and i used to create dances to our favorite music to perform for our family in the backyard. my favorite dance was to the song eyes without a face.
69. i have problems with lie-ing and mostly refuse to. this gets me into more trouble than expected.
70. i am still amused by fart jokes, the word penis, and 69 - to name only a few.
71. i plan on staying as young in thought as i can for as long as possible.
72. i plan on being physically hot at 30, and then keeping it up forever.
73. ...keeping hot goes along with my plan of never having children.
74. i believe you cannot be the same person you were before giving birth. i also believe being pregnant changes you, even if you do not have the child.
75. i have never been pregnant and would take action not to have the child if i happened to be.
76. i am charmed by others physical and mental scars - i feel they make people more real or approachable.
77. i tend to panic at parties where i do not know a majority of the people there...i will often disappear after an hour or so if obligated to go.
78. i fear i will ultimately end up permanently in an asylum.
79. my favorite thing to do when little was swimming. i would explore the bottom of the pool to find change and strange things. i lost interest in this sport when i kept finding poo.
80. i have lived with my past three boyfriends and a girlfriend. in the first three/four situations everything was separate, in this last one, nothing is.
81. i prefer well-spiced foods, sharp and sour tastes, peppery and wasabi hot. bland food makes me want to add something, salty food just makes me thirsty.
82. fried foods do horrible things to my lower intestinal tract, but i still at times crave them.
83. i think i should have more walls that i do, and that people i know should have less.
84. i believe i am great at giving advice and helping others, but i would rather not have to because i do not trust that i am relating to the same world they are, and from the same point of view.
85. i look at myself/things differently than other people - i would like to see the things others do, especially when they see things in me that i do not (although this, at times, makes me very untrusting of their opinions.)
86. i am really good at organizing people/things but become extremely upset if these things are either put out of order, or if plans change.
87. i once exchanged someone's glass of MountainDew with a mixture of green habenero paste and water. i laughed at their pain. that was bad.
88. i have a mean streak.
89. mostly i consider myself to be a good person, and would do anything for a true friend.
90. i have only been to Canada and the USofA. this makes me sad.
91. i do not feel tt and i can afford many things, travel being one of them.
92. i give in too easily to other's wants and believe i need to stick up for what i want more often.
93. ...this goes along with a lack of confidence and low self-esteem.
94. i tend to be bitter and take secret joy in other's pain when they get there comeuppence.
95. i still flinch if someone raises their hand as if to slap.
96. loud yell/arguing upsets me very much.
97. i believe i am broken like a vase...no matter how much glue you have, there will always be cracks. i hear there are certain epoxies that are stronger than the original materials they bind and hope that perhaps my imperfections will someday infuse me with strength.
98. i do not truly believe i will ever be fixed.
99. i often daydream about sleeping long before it is time to do so.
100. for the past four years, every new years resolution has been to hang in there for another year.
101. be careful what questions you ask me, for i am likely to answer them bluntly and honestly.
