It’s easy to measure your life beside another’s, but I try not to. Mostly because my priorities are (usually) vastly different from most people my age.

Today I turn twenty-five.

Officially a mid-twenties, old soul that feels like a teenager (and looks like one, too.)

I’m nostalgic, as I think most people who remember the low tech days of pre-2000s are. I’ve often been told that my writing exudes nostalgia. I don’t mind.

It’s my birthday so I thought I’d simply share twenty five things about myself:

  1. I’m so blind I can’t get lasik. I’m severely farsighted, which means I’m both farsighted and nearsighted. Even with glasses and contacts I only have a ‘clear’ middle vision. My eyes are huge behind my glasses and I know this not only because I own a mirror but because everyone has to tell me at least once. Contact prescription: +7:50 (L), +8.00 (R).
  2. Three older brothers tortured me throughout my childhood. And we all have Z names. One of them, the youngest of the boys, continued the Z tradition. So now we have eight Z names in the family. Nicknames went a little like this: Big Z, Little Z, ZZ, Z.
  3. College wasn’t for me, so I didn’t go after high school. I did go back to school eventually, after three years. (I had my associates out of high school, so I was technically only a year off schedule.) I don’t regret the time off, and still stand by that college isn’t necessary for everyone.
  4. Antagonizing sense of humor. The people in my family will pick, pick, pick, pick at you. We tease mercilessly, but without true intent to be mean. We use it as a method to break the awkward phase of getting to know someone.
  5. My first completed short story was titled, “Drop Dead.” And really, no one needs to know anymore about that.
  6. Everyone’s different, I just so happen to be one of those crazy people who still respect the sanctity marriage. That being said, when I was sixteen I thought I’d be married by twenty-one at the latest. Jokes. On. Me.
  7. Birds use to wiggle into the attic of the house I grew up in. It was one of those one foot tall attics that you couldn’t actually use. The entrance to it was in the closet of my room, so there were a few times I was scared half to death when I opened my closet door because a bird would fly out.
  8. I was spanked, but not nearly as much as my brothers. Probably deserved it just as much as them. Looking back, I find it funny. There’s really no need to be bitter about being spanked (notice: there’s a difference in spanking and abuse.) I use to run down my street when I saw my dad go get his belt, and my brother was so helpful to drag me back.
  9. Things that are genuinely terrifying: being stranded in the middle of the ocean, being stranded in space. My fight or flight instinct is to just die.
  10. Back in the day I could stay up late finishing a book, then all night to read a new one, then stay up because that third book was tempting. Admittedly, I did begin reading for escape. And man did I escape for way too many hours.
  11. Cheese is gross, or so I think. I have hated cheese so long that at this point I don’t even know if I truly don’t like it. I do, however, hate the smell and texture. The cheese aisle at HEB gags me.
  12. My rebellious stage was 8th grade. It consisted mostly of staying up all night and prank calling people. I was never good at prank calls, I’m the laugher. I just can’t pretend over the phone for more than two seconds.
  13. My middle name is Brianne. I was this close to having Opal as a middle name. Kind of wish is was now. My brothers follow the vowels with their middle names, A, E, I. Initials – ZAP, ZEP, ZIP. I was supposed to be ZOP.
  14. Screech. Ear deafening screech. In other words, I have a high-pitched scream.
  15. I’m one of those Christians who actually actively pursues the life their supposed to live, otherwise known as practicing what you preach. I’m 100% against picking and choosing what you feel like believing (in the Christian life.) I can be a little offensive. Oh well.
  16. Favorite music: my dad’s. Once upon a time my dad was in a band. He played bass and sang. They recorded their music on janky equipment, so now all we have are terrible, but endearing recordings. A stroke a few years back took his ability to keep playing.
  17. Here’s a joke I heard at work the other day: “You know how you can tell a woman is wearing pantyhose?” – “When she farts her ankles swell up.”
  18. Coming back to number one: I once worked at an ophthalmologist office in the optical side. I worked as an optician…and no I hadn’t even really been trained for the job. Fake it ’til you make it. Anyway, one day I wore my glasses and my boss, who was also the doctor’s wife and bit of a snob, said this: “Oh, are those your glasses? The lenses look like they’re coming out.” Me: “Yeah, it’s just ’cause my lenses are so thick, ha ha ha.” Her: “I don’t want you to wear them anymore.”
  19. Speaking of jobs, my first was at a steel company in the order entry department. Also can be referred to as where all the paper goes. We use to do Sudoku puzzles on slow days and see who could finish first.
  20. I had a Twilight phase. Ugh, I almost don’t want to admit it, but I was fifteen and I think I should get a free pass. Yes, me and my friends went to the midnight premiers…and yes, we made shirts.
  21. Never have I ever…done drugs. And, I’ve never been drunk. Once I was asked, “how do you have fun?” and I still crack up. What a sad life one must lead to have to ask that question.
  22. Where I’d like to be in five years: cozy house, enough land for a garden and some chickens, and working from home. Throw in travel and I’ve got it made. Oh, and if I could pet, or hold, a baby tiger it would make my year, if not my life.
  23. I’m so family oriented that my closet friends, save one, are my brothers and sister-in-laws.
  24. Awkward with the bad words. I personally don’t think there’s anything wrong with curse words, but I do think that like with all other language, they serve a purpose. However, because I’ve spent most my life not using them, if I do I sound like a twelve-year-old trying to sound cool. I’ve been meaning to make a whole post about this and the overuse of cursing in writing. Saying something every other word waters down any power a word could have.
  25. Favorite color: all shades of blue.

 

 

Cheers,