Having attended several graduations and the parties following over the past few weeks, I see how huge it is for someone to transition from childhood to adulthood. That got me thinking about the important things that have happened to me in my life; the things that have helped me become the woman I am today. I know that soon I will be experiencing many important events: I am getting married, in eight years I am turning thirty, and I bought my first room-sized rug that will be coming to my apartment any day now. But it is my past that has shaped me, so I thought I would share these milestones with you.
Writing love letters to Kirk Cameron.
When I was eight, I had a desperate crush on Mike Seaver from Growing Pains. My love was all consuming, and I started begging my mom to buy me literary masterpieces like “Tiger Beat” and “16!” so I could rip out the glamour shots of Kirk and hang them on my wall. One day I was home sick and decided that if I wrote a letter to him, professing my intense love, he’d probably show up at my house, ask me to be his girlfriend, and then take me out on a double date with Scott Baio and Alyssa Milano. Though my letters were heartfelt, they were never responded to. It was at that point that I realized I was going to have to make some big changes if I wanted to get noticed. So I did what every girl who is destined to be cool in high school did – I started doing plays. It was a decision that would shape the next ten years of my social life – or lack thereof. Choosing not to drink in high school. Now that was stupid. It wasn’t like I was up to my ears in cool from all the time I spent editing the newspaper or going to National Honor Society meetings. Though any kids reading this should know that underage drinking is very bad, from this experience, I learned that you are not cool unless you drink and make out all the time. It is a lesson I carry with me to this day.
Seeing someone bone in my presence.
In college, I had a roommate who loved her boyfriend very much. She loved him so much that he would come up on the weekends and stay in our little room and give him blowjobs while I was doing my homework. She loved him so much that they would have wild, loud sex while I was sleeping, and then when I got up and left to go sleep somewhere else, she would drag me back in the room and “pretend” to stop having sex, even though she obviously still was. What did I learn from this experience? If you put up with this kind of thing, you will be given many “I’m sorry” gifts by the roommate and the boyfriend, and then two years later when said roommate steals YOUR boyfriend, you can tell everyone what a ho-bag your roommate is so everyone hates her and buys you beers and tells you you are cool. Come to think of it, I think this same story is actually found in Aesop’s Fables.
Touching a stripper’s weave.
A few years ago, a bunch of people from work got together at a strip joint called Sindy’s Slipper to enjoy a beverage or two after work. It was a chance to catch up, talk politics, and enjoy a show. During one of these excursions, one of the dancers came up to me and started dancing up on me in my seat. Being a straight girl I was very uncomfortable and eager to distract her from the task at hand, I commented on how nice her hair was. She stopped dancing and proudly told me it was a weave. It looked so real, and I told her so, to which she responded, “TOUCH IT!” I tactfully declined, and before I knew what was happening, she yelled “TOUCH MY WEAVE!”, grabbed my hand, and jammed it into her scalp. Now, I am not a fan of touching anyone’s weaves, as I think that is their own business and not mine, so that kind of freaked me out, but I was surrounded by a large group of friends who were looking like they wanted to melt into the floor. But I survived the trauma, and it made me realize that if I put my mind to something, there wasn’t anything I couldn’t do. I also learned that her weave was extremely realistic. Watching
Red Dawn.
Okay, I will admit that this is something I only accomplished a few months ago. I got home from work and settled in to choose all of the shows I wanted to watch for the rest of the night (ah, thank God for the “reminder” option – what did we do with ourselves before it? Actually remember things on our own? Lame!) when I noticed that Red Dawn was beginning in about five minutes. Since I had never seen it, I figured that I probably should watch, so I did. The first thing that struck me was that Patrick Swayze was playing a teenager. Um, he looks to be about 35. The other thing was that the Communists were kind of speaking both Spanish and Russian. I didn’t realize they were interchangeable. But the part I loved the best was when Baby from Dirty Dancing sacrificed her own life to scare a few people. It didn’t even seem like anyone died in that scene. Anyway, I could go on, but becoming part of the cultural phenomenon known as Red Dawn has made me far more interesting at work, parties, and church picnics. I will reap the benefits that this movie has yielded me for all time. Of course there are more: trying my first cheese fry, accidentally tucking my t-shirt into my bra in seventh grade during an eighth grade study hall, getting busted by the cops at an airport for lewd behavior, things that most people experience over the course of their lives. Nicer yet to know that if I wrote Mr. Cameron a love letter today, he’d knock on my Facebook door, beg me to be his wild mid-life fling and we’d spend nights watching reruns of “Scott Baio is 46… And Pregnant.” But I don’t think Alyssa is the father.
