You’re scaring me

Here’s what scares me…

Heights

I’m sure that if I get on a ledge without a sturdy and high barrier, I will just throw myself off. I went to Ouimet Canyon, in Canada, and had to literally crawl out on the decking to look down. I did this in full view of a family with children. It was either crawl out and take a look, or waste the entire drive out there. I looked like a fool, but I felt pretty damn brave. I was trusting in the carpentry ability of people I did not know and who live somewhere even colder than I do. The platforms looked new and not too weathered, so I told myself to keeping breathing and forged ahead. Breathe in; right leg and right arm. Breathe out; left leg and left arm. I crawled like a nervous bear.

When I fly in my dreams I do not soar like an eagle. I float like someone too scared to get out of the shallow end of the pool. I hover about 3 feet off the ground. No higher. I have to fly around trees and gravestones and such. I don’t go very fast either. You know if you fall in your dream, you die.

Mars

I’m never going. Nothing good happens there.  Watch any science fiction movie. If aliens come and ask me to go along with them, I’m not even going to stick around long enough to answer. HabMoo and I have a pact that neither of us will go. Because even if they say they are from Alpha Centauri, they might really be from Mars. I will go to mars.com. That’s totally different. I like Skittles and the cats like Whiskas.

Drowning

I learned to swim, barely. I have even snorkled. But I do not get out over my head. No, no, no. I’ve breathed water into my nose before. It hurts. I have no real reason to fear the water. I sort of like going out on boats. But I want to be able to see the shore. A lake is better than the ocean. A nice stream is really the best.

Contact with my eyes or my wrists

I have a friend with tattoos on her wrists. I can’t even look at them. They horrify me. You can see the blood from your very own body in those veins at your wrists. Just stay away. That’s really the only place you can see my veins, other than my eyes.

I’d rather go to the gynecologist than the eye doctor. During a pelvic exam you’re not asked to answer questions you just can’t answer. I don’t know if this image is more clear than that one. I’m sorry, but sometimes I just can’t tell. And I hate getting answers wrong. And I blink. You’re supposed to blink. It’s good for your eyes. I will never win a staring contest. I really try to keep my eye open during that part where they test your pressure or whatever it is they do. I don’t even want to think about it.

Black ice

I totally blame the news media for this one. They make it sound like some evil gremlin just hiding out where you least expect it. It looks like nothing special. But it could be the reason for a 12-car pile up. It’s like some sort of environmental land mine. It’s not even black; it’s transparent. There could be black ice in your shower for all you know. Even if your tub is pink like mine. You have to be ever vigilant.

Drawing blood

I don’t mind getting a shot. But I hate having blood drawn. I have tiny little veins and they collapse easily. I have had nurses give up on trying to get blood out of me. They’ve made me come back on another day when a more veteran blood-drawer will be in the office. So mostly I fear being stuck because they most often do it in my hand, dangerously close to my wrists, and because it produces so much stress in the nurse. I hate making people feel bad. But three tries is all I ever give them.

Coming back as a chicken in the same neighborhood as vampire bats

Just go look at the photos here. You’ll understand after looking at the photos. Although I might have to rethink this one. Perhaps a vampire bat could be trained to draw blood for medical tests. I mean the chickens don’t seem to be bothered.

Feb. 24 update.
Thanks to the people at Mind Hacks I’m now also scared of tripping and impaling myself on the keys left in the door. And thanks to unfabulouz I’m also scared of falling the shower (perhaps due to black ice) and landing eye first on the plumbing.

My identity/personal brand

I’m doing a search of “my personal brand” which is pretty much just my name. I’m a little disconcerted to find out what’s out there. I’ve googled myself over the years and am familiar with what I find. I look like I have an interest in the Internet, economics and herbs. That’s OK.

But I’ve just found a listing of my old addresses and phone numbers at www.zabasearch.com. Some even have a birth date. I’m pleased that I’ve frequently lied about this fact over the years. (But only online. If you ask me in person, I will tell you the truth.)

It also looks like Intelius has a really old email on record. It makes me wonder if I should be frequently changing the one I use. I looked up the name of an old friend I’d like to get in touch with again, and apparently Intelius could, for a fee, give me phone, address, average income, and value of her home. That’s creepy.

I began my search at pipl.com. It posts photos. One of them was of a man I know who lives in Pakistan. Another is of a professor at the U. These photos that are not me are from comments I left on a Ning site.

Another search site is www.yasni.com. It pulled up old meeting minutes. And a photo of some man I’ve never met. It also displays a tag cloud. These are my tags: Abuzzahab Archives Buckley Bunge Burks CEHD Christian College December Economics Education Francis George Great Human Development Interview James Tobin January Knowledge Center Magazine Marketing Maroon Minnesota Nobel Prize Robert Stigler TargetX University Winner Writing

I see that I still have a Friendster account. I didn’t set it up. Some woman in the Philippines did, but she used my yahoo email to do it. And every so often she gets back in somehow. I can tell because I start getting IMs and emails telling me “I love Asian women.” Also creepy. But I checked and Friendster still reports I’m old and married and in the U.S.

Apparently I set up two MySpace profiles. I’d never noticed. I don’t use either. I have a Spoke account I totally forgot about. Somehow it has me working in Duluth. But the photo is me. I think I’ll just delete it. I think LinkedIn has supplanted Spoke. But now I have to determine what email address I used when I signed up.

This is making me think more carefully about having multiple email accounts and signing up for things just to see how they work. I might have to create a personal “un-brand” for such purposes. That might be fun. Who shall I be? Maybe I’ll be that 98-year-old CEO who makes $25,000 a year that I sometimes pretend to me when completing surveys asking for personal information I see no reason for having to complete.

I find it funny that I was asked during an interview what social networks I belonged to. I have forgotten so many of these. I signed up for Jaiku over a year ago and it’s similar to Twitter. I never used it.

Hey I made scholar.google! That’s kind of cool. The article is old, but it’s been cited twice.”Kristeen Bullwinkle (1998) suggested that more integration of textbook, Internet, and websites would enhance the learning of economics.” Who knew?

Check on who is using your preferred Internet username and curse away: http://usernamecheck.com.

If you’re overly curious about yourself, take a look at http://jobmob.co.il/blog/online-reputation-management-resources-tips/ and go to town.

Dogs I have known

My first dog must have been Sugar, who I do not remember. But I’ve heard so many stories of how after she died, the neighbor dog would come every morning and wait at the back door for her. It’s too bad that dogs don’t get to run around with their friends any longer. It was often fun to see a few dogs playing in a field together. But I also recall riding my bike or pony past loose dogs and being terrified that they were going to chase me. And often they did.

The neighbors had a German shepherd I was particularly scared of. When I was maybe five years old, I went outside one morning and saw part of a kitten on one side of the sidewalk and it’s leg and thigh on the other. That dog had torn my kitten apart. He also got loose once and left a trail of baby rabbits (we raised bunnies) across our yard and the neighbor’s. And once, while riding my pony, Pokey, on the sidewalk on our way home with my sister, that dog ran out and jumped up high enough to get its front legs on Pokey’s back. I fell to the ground. Pokey was such a good pony that while she did step on my chest, she only left a bruise.

Mostly I think dogs are good for you. I miss taking Judd out walking during the winter. The colder it was, the happier he was to be outside and running. I’m sure he was responsible for most of my vitamin D intake during those months. I loved feeding off his emotions and élan. He’d rather run than eat.

Although when he did eat he didn’t always make the best choices. He once ate baking soda that my sister had in her barn to use on the goats. It was during the winter. His poor little tummy make all sorts of racket and he left large foaming piles out in the yard.

Dogs seem to be easily confused. My sister, Everbelly, had an Irish setter named Casey. Casey was a very good and well-behaved dog, but she thought she was a cat. This didn’t pose much of a problem until both she and the cat had babies. Casey chose to nurse the cats rather than her puppies. Even after the cat had weaned her kittens, Casey would nurse them. My sister used to find her with bloody nipples and have to kick her and one persistent kitten apart. Casey managed to raise only one of her own puppies and each time the cat had kittens, she lactated. Later Everbelly had another dog, a border terrier, who would nurse baby goats.

Perhaps female dogs are simply very maternal. I remember my father talking about how every time they brought my oldest sister home, and several time during the day, they would have to unwrap her and show her to the dog. She was very protective of the baby and would frequently need to check on her. It gives a new meaning to the word bitch.

Weird/interesting dog facts:

• Teddy Roosevelt’s dog, Pete, ripped a French ambassador’s pants off at the White House.
• Basset Hounds cannot swim.
• Three dogs survived the sinking of the Titanic—a Newfoundland, a Pomeranian, and a Pekingese
• Up until the late 1800s, Collies were known as Scottish Sheepdogs

Week 5 of optimism

My wanton act of optimism has been a success so far, I’m happy to report. It’s involved much more time with my mother and her doctors than I expected, but I feel so grateful that I’ve been available to go with her to all her appointments. She’s a treat and it’s good to spend time with her. It’s also frustrating, but without the stress of my previous workplace, I’m not adding even more frustration to the equation. I can be patient and enjoy the comedy there in her forgetfulness. (Luckily she can also often see the humor.)

I think my story is evolving. It was very hard during a job interview last week for me to come up with a story about a project I’d worked on in the last three years that I was really satisfied with. For some reason I started talking about the not-to-be-called-a-merger merger. I learned a lot from that experience, but it was mostly about the consequences of bad communication and how a communications office can’t fix bad communication coming from above. It’s hard to spin the negative story. But I think I’m at a point where I can say I left because I couldn’t provide the level of support the place needed. Not because I didn’t have the talent, nor because of a lack of talent around me, but because other resources were lacking and because the culture had become one of disengagement and distrust. The story feels so similar to my story of leaving a former long-term intimate relationship. It is all about relationships after all. And everyone has a breakup story. The interesting part is always what comes after.

I recall saying several times that if I couldn’t be a cheerleader, I needed to get off the playing field. Getting off the playing field has meant that I can see beyond the stands now. Did you know there are sometimes parties in the parking lot? And people driving by who aren’t in the least bit interested in what’s going on down on the field? I’m rediscovering this. I’m looking around for where I want to be, where my curiosity takes me.

Feedback from friends is positive. I’m apparently much more fun to be around. I feel much more fun to be with. And I’m feeling some curiosity again.

My dreams no longer wake me with feelings of anger or frustration. I still have those feelings and probably will for a while longer. But I sleep through the night without grinding my teeth and have much more interesting and odd dreams. Dreams that don’t hit me over the head with their messages.

I’m also coming to terms with the limits of my own power. I couldn’t fix a former partner. I couldn’t fix an institution or even a department. I can guide. I can support. I can encourage. I can counsel. I can facilitate. But I can’t make change happen anywhere but in my own life. I happen to hate this fact. Maybe in another five weeks, I’ll see the advantages of it.

I’m still optimistic. I’ve only interviewed once, but I’ve challenged myself to network and I’ve done the dreary work of filling out online applications. Doing both have given me a sense of accomplishment. That’s not something I’ve felt for too long a time.

Why?

There are pictures of me in my crib, too young to walk, snapping my fingers. Wouldn’t you think I’ve have some minimal amount of rhythm?

There’s a box of soup mix that’s been sitting on my kitchen counter for just over 3 years now? Why can’t I throw it away? It was a Xmas gift, but still.

Why can’t cats show a little consideration? They are SO demanding. I think a “please” and “thank you” would be warranted. Don’t you? Maybe the next time I give them a ham treat, I’ll try expressing my thanks for the opportunity to serve.

Why are employment interviews so stressful? I think it’s because we try to package ourselves. Doesn’t that involve wrapping ourselves up neatly, adding some fluff, and finishing with a bit of string tied into a bow? I’d rather not “package” myself. I think I’ll reveal myself instead. I’m already a beautiful gift and it’s a shared experience discovering all that’s inside.

How come “mancation” doesn’t mean a bunch of men getting together for a vacation? Instead it means “mutilation.” At least according to the Save the Words site. (Go visit the site and adopt a word. I adopted “cloakatively”. I thought it might have something to do with espionage, but it just means “superficially.”)

Why don’t people use the word “fustilug” more often? I frequently use the term when referring to my largest cat. (It means gross, fat, and unwieldy.) It’s in the Urban Dictionary, so perhaps I’m just not hip enough to hear the word used in regular speech.

Random thoughts III

Favorite spam entries

swiss army bread bag
Now does’t this get your imagination going? All I can come up with to do with my bread bags is pack a lunch or dispose of cat litter. But those Swiss Army people probably have awesome cool ideas that I’m missing out on. I’m thinking there’s probably something for actually transporting bread, but maybe you can also put it over your head for night vision or use it as a floating row cover in your garden. I looked it up and there really is a Swiss Army bread bag and it’s pretty damn boring. All it has is adjustable straps. How disappointing.

john deer belly rings
This sounds like something my nephew would have wanted had he been a girl and grown up during the time of belly rings. I recall him telling me about school yard fights over John Deere versus International Harvester and Ford versus Chevy. How cool would you be if you had a John Deere tractor replica hanging out of your belly button? Or how desperately uncool would that be? You be the judge. See one for yourself.

The scoop on baby corn

I finally looked this up. It really is just baby corn. Seems like a huge waste. Sort of like eating green bell peppers instead of waiting until they’re red and much more tasty.

Never heard of the fig

mental_floss has a very enlightening article, Why Is The Middle Finger Offensive?

I’m still looking for a job – just not one of these

However, I am considering calling someone a gong farmer and maybe getting into a fight over it.

Again from mental_floss: 10 Jobs You Didn’t Hear About On Career Day

Shoot!

I think there’s a myth that children like to do things to scare themselves. I’m not so sure. Yes, I jumped off roofs, played chicken with cars, and listened to ghost stories, but only to prove how tough I was. It was not to scare myself. But as an adult I’m trying to do a few things that frighten me or take me out of my comfort zone. Last week I went to a professional group’s mixer and talked with people I didn’t know. But a few months ago I did something much scarier. I took a defensive handgun class.

Now I’m not a fan of guns. I recall, correctly or not, my grandmother telling me in hushed tones that she had another brother who they didn’t talk about. He had died. Her older brother had shot him when they were both little kids and if you said his name the older brother would walk out of the room. That made an impression. There were guns in my house when I was growing up. I think. I never saw them, but I did see a holster my father hand-tooled in leather. I played with cap guns. But only if we playing Big Valley and I got to be Audra who carried a little deringer. It was really more of a fashion statement than a weapon.

Then I grew up and married a gun nut. I’d be quite happy if no one was allowed to own guns. Then I welcomed this man into my bedroom and all his arms into a closet with a new lock on it. The guns make me nervous. They symbolize violence and death to me. These are scary concepts now made visible in my home.

I realized that I might, if threatened, decide to take hold of one of these weapons. (In the past I’ve tended to arm myself with pens or butter knives when investigating an unknown noise downstairs.) If I didn’t want to be holding something in my hand that scared me as much or more than an intruder, I should learn how to shoot the thing. So, for that reason, and because I wanted to scare myself by doing something out of my comfort zone, and because I knew it would make HabMoo very happy, I told him I wanted to take a class.

The first thing I had to do was go to a sheriff’s office to get some sort of credentials. I didn’t pay  much attention. I gave up a fingerprint and $10 and received a form after they ran a background check of some sort. That and a handgun, lots of ammo, magazines, eye and ear protection, and some lunch was all I needed. I let HabMoo take care of all of it except the lunch.

I was nervous driving out to the range. I had discovered that all my jeans come all the way up to the waist and a holster up that high might make it uncomfortable to draw. Which turned out to be true. I had shot a few times before, but unless I was shooting something I hated (like an old DVD player) or something that produced a few special effects (like a jug full of colored water) it didn’t really capture my interest. So ahead of me was 8 hours–yes a full day–of shooting at a paper target.

We drove up to what looked to me like an abandoned gravel pit/newly created junk yard. There were some old drums full of garbage, a couple of folding chairs, and other refuse. It didn’t really inspire confidencee. A few other vehicles drove up and it did appear that we were in the right place. And, no suprise, I was the only woman. And the toilet was basically among the small bushes and grass behind where we all parked. So far, so good. I could deal with all of this.

But I had no idea what culture I was in. What were the norms? What would be considered appropriate behavior? I put on the belt and holster and gun. It did not feel comfortable. But no one stared at that. HabMoo took my photo. Everyone was friendly and talked about nothing in particular. The instructors began and we had to introduce ourselves and our weapon. I had asked HabMoo to tell me what kind of gun I would be shooting before we got there. So the first round of questioning posed no problems. I aced it. (Don’t ask me today what I shot, however. I have no idea.) And the first part of the course was going to be lecture. Not a problem. I could calm down.

I didn’t receive any range safety information, but I did learn a lot more about what people who have carry permits worry about. We discussed how to transport your weapon, what might set off alarms in a police officer, when it might be legal to shoot, when it might not be, and why. My concerns with personal safety have always been along the lines of how to not look like an easy mark for a bad pick-up line or a purse snatching. I look inside my car before I get in it and I know how to do the testicular jerk. I’ve never worried about riots or someone entering my home with a weapon or having my family threatened.

After the lecture/discussion came some real shooting and then my nerves kicked into action. I had to load a magazine. This I need way more practice in. Or more finger muscles or something. Thankfully HabMoo brought along some little device that made it much easier for me. But I was still the last one to get loaded. And now I had a loaded gun in my holster on my hip. And so did all these other guys. I was walking along with armed men. That is scary even if I couldn’t imagine them all using me for target practice. I could trust these strange men that much.

I told myself that the only thing I had to do to make this a sucessful day was to make it through the day. I didn’t expect to be able to shoot well. I would even allow myself to take the dumb girl role if needed. (Act like the blonde stereotype and giggle at everything as if it were a joke.) And I didn’t shoot well. But I was able to press the tringger and I was able to produce holes in my target. The fact the one instructor seemed to devote himself entirely to my instruction could be seen as kind of flattering. Right?

We took breaks to reload and rest. I really needed the rest. My shoulder started hurting after maybe 20 minutes of shooting and we  had the rest of the morning and all afternoon ahead of us. The guys seemed to really be enjoying themselves. One seemed a little concerned with his abilities and equipment, but I was there so he didn’t have to worry about being the lowest common denominator. We all chatted and no one showed surprise about HabMoo and I being married. (With some regularity people first assume that I’m his mother. But I’m sure it’s uncommon for sons and mothers to attend handgun classes together outside of Texas.) They expressed their approval of the reasons why I was taking the class and I relaxed my well developed social anxiety muscles.

Then came more shooting followed by lunch in the junkyard portion of the site. I was the only person there eating a vegetarian lunch and drinking carob soy milk. I felt like a cultural envoy.

More shooting followed. It was determined that I had a terrible flinch, because I anticipated every shot and recoiled from it a bit. Well, yes. I was shooting bullets. A part of me was still recoiling just from that fact. I had twice violated range safety and received only a gentle redirecting of my gun by the instructor or the marksman next to me. If someone had slapped me for it, I would have accepted that as appropriate punishment. I was unsure of myself, still scared of the gun’s potential uses, and experiencing pain in my shoulder. For the entire afternoon I shot with blanks interspersed with regular bullets so I wouldn’t know when I’d have a live round and when I wouldn’t. To build my confidence perhaps, the instructors reminded us that it wasn’t necessary to hit the head of the target. Hitting anywhere on the body would tend to discourage an assailant. Hitting a real person with a real bullet really wasn’t what I wanted to be thinking about.

We were all assured that we would pass the final test of shooting our targets from various distances. I didn’t care if I passed or not. I just didn’t want to pass out.

I passed. I was in pain and I had the fewest holes in my target, but I passed. I was disappointed that there was no written exam. I’m sure I could have outscored someone in a written test. Certificates were handed out and we headed for home.

This was the best part of the experience. Since HabMoo and I don’t agree on issues of handguns, or many political issues, we don’t often discuss them. Now we talked all the way home. Neither of us had had an experience to change our opinions, but we’d had a shared experience. We could begin the discuss from that point. I complained about the lack of safety issues covered, and he talked what he thought of their advice on what a citizen’s reaction to the police should be following a lethal force incident. I can’t even imagine that scenario (or use that language), let alone argue what the proper reaction should be. But listening to each other was transformative. I hadn’t expected this marriage enrighment side effect.

The outcome for me? I felt proud of doing something scary and not falling into the stupid girl role. I felt that while I had married a nut, he’s a nut who is comfortable with me disagreeing with him, and I love him. And I decided that I did want to carry. I decided to carry a flashlight.