Friday 5: Person on the street
Hello and happy, um, Sunday!
Last week, my week off from work, was a string of days blurred together by household chores: donate here, donate there, car repairs (which could be their own post), returns, a hair appointment, trips to the gym, and far too much rain. The rain finally stopped and prematurely dumped us into July humidity, three days ahead of schedule.
But I didn’t get to go to the beach. I didn’t get to go into Philadelphia to prowl stationery stores. I didn’t even snag a mid-day lemonade.
It’s okay. June was still beautiful.
WM’s last day of school was Friday and I can finally exhale. I worry all school year about tragedy. I wish I could retire him early.
Make that both of us. I’d make a great retired person.
Here’s a Sunday treat: a very tardy Friday 5. This week’s theme is Person on the Street, which I am old enough to recall as Man on the Street.
- What is one lie you tell yourself every day?
“You are calm, confident, and capable.”
Sometimes I’m two of the three, but I never feel I hit all three at the same time. - What is your weirdest habit?
I try to balance on one leg while I brush my teeth. I have an electric toothbrush that beeps every thirty seconds to remind me to move to another quadrant of my mouth and when it does that I switch legs.
Balance is everything, especially when you’re genetically clumsy. - What is a controversial opinion you have about a very mundane thing?
Many things taste much better than thin feels. - What is the worst advice you actually followed?
“Be good.”
I should have had more fun when I was younger. I wish I had stayed out all night, slept around, dressed more provocatively, and partied harder without caring what other people would think of me. - What is a risk you’re glad you took?
I’m very glad I got married again.
It’ll be fourteen years (the Ivory Anniversary) on July 5th and it’s good. This marriage benefited greatly from two certified pre-owned spouses.
Submitted shamefacedly and with a promise to get back on blog track soon!
**1 Comment**
I got into a lot of trouble when I was young, but it wasn’t the kind of trouble “be good” warns against. Although I mostly don’t regret being good, understanding the many great or tragic stories I lived not to tell, I feel very much the way you feel. I wish I’d done a few things.
One of my HS classmates was the leader of a graffiti crew (I wouldn’t call them a gang). Notorious among high-schoolers in this city, he left his tag everywhere, and when the city cracked down, they made a HUGE example of him. Arrested him DURING class, pulling him out of his desk during 11th-grade precalculus, cuffing him right there and pulling him out the door. I was home sick that day and missed it!
Today, he’s the VP and general counsel of one of our city’s public utilities. The alma mater, a small, private school, frequently profiles him as one of the proud alumni who made it. So he is again a big, public example.
He’s a good friend. In a lot of places, the kind of guy who would likely have never been a friend to this bookish, mouthy nerdboy. But every time I see him in these profiles, I think: everyone lied to us about being good, and they lied about those permanent records!