2 for the price of 1

Many moons ago, I was indirectly tagged by Moobs, and then again more recently (and directly) by Mommy off the Record. But because of scathing pain and a need to meet deadlines, I’ve been acting like a bureaucrat, tabling the whole tag thing, the whole BLOG thing, for that matter. But I’m on the mend and in the mood to share, and so here are my tag rejoinders:

The direct tag first:

20 years ago, I was horrified because I noticed that my boobs were growing exponentially faster than the rest of my fourteen-year-old body. So much so that I felt I needed to start wearing jackets around the clock (even if it was 108 degrees in the shade), and walking with a hunch so as to not draw attention to “them.” While other kids my age were going to the city pool or playing in a girls’ softball league, I chose to stay home and read Seventeen magazine, trying to figure out how I would clothe my boobs in the fall when I would be entering the halls of the high school for the first time. Meanwhile, Seventeen, with all it’s lovely summer advertisements, convinced me that my jet black hair would look lots swankier with highlights. So I went out and bought me some Sun In, and some lemon juice (for good measure), and then spent the rest of my afternoons basking in the hot New Mexico sun with a towel around my neck and STUFF in my hair. Needless to say I started high school with D-cup boobs and hair the color of a MacGregor basketball. Very incognito.

10 years ago, I was sleeping. And sleeping. And sleeping some more. I’d just finished college and was mentally preparing myself for a lifetime career in government work writing waste management plans… in the Ozarks. I was growing out a very poor excuse for a Rachel haircut (that was still not the right color) and deciding that I wanted to write a novel.

5 years ago, I was packing up and moving to Colorado for an imagined life filled with skiing trips in winter. Rafting trips in the late spring. Neither of which has happened, by the way.

3 years ago, I was reevaluating my whole life. I was watching too much TV and realizing in earnest that I was no longer a Catholic.

1 year ago, I was recovering after having given birth to my fourth and final child. Oh yeah, and reeling from the idea that my finished novel actually made its way to a contract.

Yesterday, and the day before that, and the day before that, and the day before THAT, I was Infirmed with a capital I. I was jonesing for a muumuu and an efficient tranquilizer that would wake me (sans side effects) in two weeks.

Today, I am still a little dizzy. And shaky. And hungry for the first time in a long time.

Tomorrow, I shall try to get some sun, and maybe the mail.

Next year ,I plan to stay away from anything that even REMOTELY causes a week's worth of bed rest and a new wardrobe.

Next tag:

1) Why didn’t you think to say that at the time?
Ten minutes later you had the perfect comeback. What was it you should have said? Exact words please.

“You give new meaning to the word jackass.”

(2) A Damn Good Hiding
Have you ever hidden anything under your mattress? If so, what?

Yes. It was a highly-sought-after photograph. And my life’s deepest secrets. But the mattress (and photograph and secrets) were in my novel.

(3) Guilt Trip
Have you ever felt guilty about something for more than a year? If so, what?

Yes. I need to clean underneath the fridge, and it’s been gnawing at me for a year, at the very least.

(4) Mother Knows Best
Name one thing you kept secret from your mother.

My period. My very first period. It lasted TWO CONSECUTIVE months. I didn’t want to be hospitalized or labeled as “a bleeder,” so I went about business as usual and tried not to run so as not to draw attention to myself… or faint.

(5) Missed Opportunities
Is there someone from your past who, you now wonder, might have been your great missed love? If so, what are they doing now?

His name is Joseph. He owns his own sugarless cookie company (and did even back when I knew him). We went to high school together and graduated together, and now he’s gallivanting across the western world selling cookies to the rich and famous. He gave me a rose on graduation day and said he had always secretly liked me. I took the rose and then chose to stay with the boy I would later divorce.

(6) Poetry Please
What is the first line of the last poem you wrote?

“Like vacant chalkboards and clear, blue skies”

(I feel compelled to say that this wasn’t a poem about my gastrointestinal system.)