At the Beginning...
The thing that everyone needs to know about me is this:
I'm NOT good at this.
Ask me a question and I will answer. I will tell you the straight-up truth, everytime, though it might sting, and you may hit me with a big "TMI!" But I will tell you.
But
It's hard for me to spontaneously create.
Like how it's easy for me to paint a portrait of a person who actually exists, but I cannot envision a face that I have never seen.
And I'm not even boring!
I've lived a spectacular life, more bizarre and unbelievable than pretty much anyone you have ever met. They could write a Northern Exposure-meets-Seinfeld-meets-The Family Guy TV series about my life, and never run out of material.
But it may never occur to me to tell it, because the exotic details of my life are commonplace and mundane to me. It's your life that seems outlandish to me. Little plastic switches on every wall that make a room flood with light! Turn a little knob, and water comes shooting out of pipe! HOT water! No muscle power necessary! That is freaking COOL! I may never fully come to grips with that.
But my life? Eh...
The teepee is kinda interesting...
And I have a fun dog that knows how to open doors with his calloused, prehensile nose. All doors. Even ones on which humans must use their opposable thumbs.
But that's my dog. That's not me.
But I'll do my best to express thoughts that are readable and entertaining to those who lead the "normal" life.
The problem is, where do I even start?
Here goes:
I am the product of Nancy and Brian, two of the most dedicated hippies in existence. We reside in a little country farmhouse, in a tiny town, in a tiny state. It was purchased, along with the acre of land surrounding it, in 1976 for a grand total of $8,500 (money probably raised by the growing and selling of some pretty good pot). It is an unremarkable house in many ways, and completely unique in many more, most specifically, the part about never having been wired with electricity or phone lines, or had the plumbing for running water installed. That wasn't in the budget 29 years ago. Now, we could afford it, but... Why bother? You know?
That is my current living situation. Being 25 years old, you'd think that I'd be off on my own by now. But I can't get over the fear that my parents would get themselves in trouble if I left them to fend for themselves. Someone needs to keep an eye on them, and make sure they pay their cell phone bills (which had to be in my name, because neither of them ever bothered to look into the issue of credit cards).
I have an older brother who gets himself into trouble more often than my parents do (his cell phone is also in my name). He occupies the second floor of my grandmother's house so the two of them can keep an eye on each other, neither being completely in control, so to speak. Gram is getting on in age, and my brother smokes enough pot to incapacitate a rhino. It works out well because she can't smell, and he smells pretty damn bad.
Pause:: Joe just called me. My favorite quote from that conversation was: "Ew. The word blood is gross. Blood. Blood. Ew." That was him. Apparently I just surround myself with odd people.
Play>>
I have the afore-mentioned, cool, ambidextrous dog. He is a monstrous, 130 lbs Weimaraner named Ivan the Terrible III.
I have a strictly outdoors cat named Baby who is sustained almost exclusively by trapped flying squirrels. (Or what I like to call "winged demon spawn of Satan." I'm not a fan of rodents of any kind.)
I work at a non-descript coffee/baked good chain (whose color scheme does not include pink and orange. God forbid.). It is a big job, considering this state contains the "Coffee Capital of the World." Literally, more coffee shops per square mile than any city in any country. Now that is something to brag about. They didn't just arbitrarily choose Providence with a map, a pin, and a blindfold, and say "Here is where we will invest $23 million of our advertising budget!" There was actual method behind their madness.
I have a best friend who, somehow, has managed to keep track of me (and me of him) for 19 1/2 years. 20 in September, when we celebrate the anniversary of when we started kindergarten.
Do not for a moment think that his life is any more normal than mine.
Scratch that. I temporarily forgot our motto: We are the normal ones. Everyone else is weird.
And that is the basic foundation of my life.
Of course there is more I could tell you, like the fact that I have 6 tattoos, scattered strategically around my body, that I have procured in 3 different countries, located on 2 different continents. Or that my parents were finally married when I was 16, after having spent 25 years together. They figured that they got the tough stuff like buying a house and having kids out of the way. They don't like to jump into anything.
Or that I was allowed to choose my last name when I started kindergarten at age 5, as was my brother when he started 2nd grade at the same time. Obviously, we chose different ones and stuck with them, never wanting people to come to the conclusion that we are related.
Any questions?
There will be a quiz at the end of every chapter.
(Just kidding.)
I'm NOT good at this.
Ask me a question and I will answer. I will tell you the straight-up truth, everytime, though it might sting, and you may hit me with a big "TMI!" But I will tell you.
But
It's hard for me to spontaneously create.
Like how it's easy for me to paint a portrait of a person who actually exists, but I cannot envision a face that I have never seen.
And I'm not even boring!
I've lived a spectacular life, more bizarre and unbelievable than pretty much anyone you have ever met. They could write a Northern Exposure-meets-Seinfeld-meets-The Family Guy TV series about my life, and never run out of material.
But it may never occur to me to tell it, because the exotic details of my life are commonplace and mundane to me. It's your life that seems outlandish to me. Little plastic switches on every wall that make a room flood with light! Turn a little knob, and water comes shooting out of pipe! HOT water! No muscle power necessary! That is freaking COOL! I may never fully come to grips with that.
But my life? Eh...
The teepee is kinda interesting...
And I have a fun dog that knows how to open doors with his calloused, prehensile nose. All doors. Even ones on which humans must use their opposable thumbs.
But that's my dog. That's not me.
But I'll do my best to express thoughts that are readable and entertaining to those who lead the "normal" life.
The problem is, where do I even start?
Here goes:
I am the product of Nancy and Brian, two of the most dedicated hippies in existence. We reside in a little country farmhouse, in a tiny town, in a tiny state. It was purchased, along with the acre of land surrounding it, in 1976 for a grand total of $8,500 (money probably raised by the growing and selling of some pretty good pot). It is an unremarkable house in many ways, and completely unique in many more, most specifically, the part about never having been wired with electricity or phone lines, or had the plumbing for running water installed. That wasn't in the budget 29 years ago. Now, we could afford it, but... Why bother? You know?
That is my current living situation. Being 25 years old, you'd think that I'd be off on my own by now. But I can't get over the fear that my parents would get themselves in trouble if I left them to fend for themselves. Someone needs to keep an eye on them, and make sure they pay their cell phone bills (which had to be in my name, because neither of them ever bothered to look into the issue of credit cards).
I have an older brother who gets himself into trouble more often than my parents do (his cell phone is also in my name). He occupies the second floor of my grandmother's house so the two of them can keep an eye on each other, neither being completely in control, so to speak. Gram is getting on in age, and my brother smokes enough pot to incapacitate a rhino. It works out well because she can't smell, and he smells pretty damn bad.
Pause:: Joe just called me. My favorite quote from that conversation was: "Ew. The word blood is gross. Blood. Blood. Ew." That was him. Apparently I just surround myself with odd people.
Play>>
I have the afore-mentioned, cool, ambidextrous dog. He is a monstrous, 130 lbs Weimaraner named Ivan the Terrible III.
I have a strictly outdoors cat named Baby who is sustained almost exclusively by trapped flying squirrels. (Or what I like to call "winged demon spawn of Satan." I'm not a fan of rodents of any kind.)
I work at a non-descript coffee/baked good chain (whose color scheme does not include pink and orange. God forbid.). It is a big job, considering this state contains the "Coffee Capital of the World." Literally, more coffee shops per square mile than any city in any country. Now that is something to brag about. They didn't just arbitrarily choose Providence with a map, a pin, and a blindfold, and say "Here is where we will invest $23 million of our advertising budget!" There was actual method behind their madness.
I have a best friend who, somehow, has managed to keep track of me (and me of him) for 19 1/2 years. 20 in September, when we celebrate the anniversary of when we started kindergarten.
Do not for a moment think that his life is any more normal than mine.
Scratch that. I temporarily forgot our motto: We are the normal ones. Everyone else is weird.
And that is the basic foundation of my life.
Of course there is more I could tell you, like the fact that I have 6 tattoos, scattered strategically around my body, that I have procured in 3 different countries, located on 2 different continents. Or that my parents were finally married when I was 16, after having spent 25 years together. They figured that they got the tough stuff like buying a house and having kids out of the way. They don't like to jump into anything.
Or that I was allowed to choose my last name when I started kindergarten at age 5, as was my brother when he started 2nd grade at the same time. Obviously, we chose different ones and stuck with them, never wanting people to come to the conclusion that we are related.
Any questions?
There will be a quiz at the end of every chapter.
(Just kidding.)
posted by Kally Hanifin at 12:33:00 AM
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