Straight No Chaser

Educating the Public

these do get banal very fast, but i guess it's a quick-and-dirty way of getting to know people. also, other people did it first. a warning: boring questions make me very long-winded.

what color pants are you wearing right now?

hmm. let's skip this.

instead: ten things the writing.com community doesn't know about me, ranging from fairly to moderately to pretty personal (and interesting), in that order.

1. i was named "most prolific reader/writer" by ms. williams, my fourth grade teacher, at the end of the school year. this high award came complete with a gorgeous certificate (lost at least seven years ago), a pizza hut coupon (used that same night) and a box full of brand new books left over from the school book fair. i was so happy about the books that i cried right there in class, thanked ms. williams profusely and read them all that same summer. of the books, my favorite was (and is) the phanton tollbooth, which i have every intention of reading to my kids someday.

2. i had braces for almost eight years. i'd like to think i have the straightest teeth in maryland now, but after a three-month no-retainer stint the bottom ones are hopelessly crooked.

3. i had the fastest fingers at my teacher's piano studio when i was studying with her. she always picked the really technical staccato pieces for me, mostly giggly sonatinas, to show off my fingerwork, but i always wanted to learn the longer, more sensuous, drawn-out etudes. it was really frustrating, and still is, because even now i don't emote as well as i'd like to on the piano. and i took it for thirteen years.

4. i was never scared of the dark, but i've always always always slept with my back to the wall, and when there is no wall (as there isn't in my bedroom's current configuration), i sleep with the covers over my head. it really has nothing to do with monsters in the closet or any such ridiculousness, but it keeps me calm and warm and blocks out the distractions, a necessity because i have always had a really hard time getting to sleep.

5. the longest i've ever gone without eating is eleven days. this was in tenth grade and it was 25% self-punishment, 25% curiosity and 50% the absolute lack of an appetite. i drank lots and lots of water and shuffled around and jason said i looked "scary." then he asked me out. go figure.

6. the first time i ever straddled that weird gap between second and third bases was when i was fifteen, and was with a twenty-two-year-old tennis instructor from kingston, jamaica. it was horribly unpleasant and almost got me fired from my summer job, but i felt like royalty for about a week afterward.

7. in rare moments of weakness i find i just HAVE to eat a piece of bacon. in eight years i've consumed maybe three total servings of red meat. how embarrassing.

8. i've had sex dreams about pretty much every non-familial male i've ever known, and it so happens that the quality of the dream-sex is always proportionate to the quality of the real-life relationship. dream-sex with marcus is long-lasting, melodious and invariably satisfying; dream-sex wtih sean comes in skittish little spurts and rarely ends well for either of us; dream-sex wtih cannon is noisily unhappy. the commonest thread among all the dream-sex is the scenery; it's always outdoors and public and sometimes my hands are tied down, and none of this seems to bother me. what does bother me is when the entering phallus is shaped like something weird, maybe a toothbrush or a horseshoe, as it frequently is.

9. i think dishonesty, infidelity and physical abuse are all unequivocally unforgivable crimes, and have no place in a meaningful relationship. my brief high school boyfriend will forever be remembered as the gallant soul who introduced me to all three, without favoring any particular one. when i say they are "unforgivable" i don't mean to sound preachy; do what you want but don't expect to be forgiven if you do it to me.

10. i'm not a natural blonde. just kidding! i'm not a fake blonde either. but i did erase my original number ten, because suddenly it seemed like it was maybe a little too personal. so, hmmm...for lack of a better one, i have three wrist tendons, while most people have two. i'm a mutant!

guilty pleasures next, i guess? maybe we'll come across the elusive number ten again.