My first meme
I got tagged by Chicky Chicky Baby (well I'm not entirely sure since she didn't actually name me but I'll assume in this instance) for my first meme. Thanks! I wrote some of it last night before I crashed, but had to finish it this morning. Here goes:
20 years ago I...
- Was 17 and was all excited about going to my high school formal (prom) with my high school boyfriend (of several years at that point). My family
nicknamed him Lurch, so I'll call him that here. I remember it being the hugest event, the thing we talked out every day at lunch and how important it was to have everything just perfect. In the small town I grew up in it didn't really matter of much who you went with, or even what you were wearing. The big deal was how you and your date arrived.
Crowds of people showed up to watch in front of the town hall to see all the creative ways people arrived. The town crier would announce you and your date to the crowd, and photographers from the local paper were there. Some people rented school buses, others came in on dogsleds pulled by teams of huskies and one couple even showed up in the cherry picker bucket of a hydro truck. Lurch and I had hoped to arrive being pulled in by miniature horses, but that fell through and we just had a regular horse and carriage one year and his uncle's 1929 Graham Paige the next year.
I went a few years later to see my younger sister go to formal, and I was amazed at how rinkey-dink it was. When I was actually there it was like we were arriving to a red carpet premiere or the Oscars and I remembered it being this HUGE event everyone looked forward to, THE social event of the year (for the whole town!) and watching it made me wonder "wow... this is it???" Funny how time brings so much perspective. - Was one credit short of finishing high school a year early. I was also convinced Lurch was the guy I was going to marry. Thank God he saw fit to dump me a couple of years later, 'cause marrying him would have been a big mistake.
- I was working part time at Bulk Barn and full time during the summer at the Land Registry Office.
- Lost my grandfather to a heart attack. I spent a couple of summers working in the city where he and my grandmother lived so I used to go over to their house for lunch every day. I miss those lunches and the chances they gave me to ask him about his life and hear stories.
- Wrote the LSAT and sucked at it. And look, I'm still a lawyer.
- Was living with an insane roommate in a fire trap of a basement apartment. Two days before we moved in they had to dig up the floor because sewage was leaking through the floor. I had to duck because the ceilings were low at some spots. I'm only 5"4. The furnace was literally located IN my room.
The roommate was a diagnosed bipolar chick who decided she no longer required meds. She probably had a few other undiagnosed psychiatric conditions. I can recall times where she had no fewer than 14 different guys visit her bedroom in the span of 7 days. And these guys didn't stop by for the hot plate cooking. And the walls were thin. She would spend a thousand dollars in one day and not recall what she bought. She eventually got pretty nasty to me (and stole a dress and a very expensive pair of sunglasses from the girls upstairs). I pretty much stayed in my tiny room with the door locked when she was there or hung out with the girls living upstairs. The one good thing that came out of my friendship with her was that she was the one who adopted Scarlett from the humane society as a birthday gift during one of her manic episodes, and man is she a cute cat! (and I paid her back for the cost of adopting her).
- Dated a weenie guy named Mark from Wyandotte, Michigan. He was pretty, but dumb. He had two tortoises. One was named Sheldon and the other was Myrtle. His disabled mum looked after them for the most part. He went to Thailand that summer and came back crazy. I don't think he'd realized there was a whole other world outside suburban Detroit.
- Was living in an awesome apartment in Windsor. It was in an old building with 12 foot ceilings, crown moldings, huge windows and tons of storage space. Plus, living there meant I was close to the bridge, which also meant close to Mexcantown across the river in Detroit. Man they make wicked good food there, and the margaritas were awesome. We made many trips.
- Was scared I wasn't going to get hired back at my articling job.. I didn't get hired back, and everything turned out pretty well in the end. I was also applying for jobs like a woman possessed, which is probably why I landed a really crappy one to start.
- Could rollerblade to work, and right into an office meeting on the second floor without most people there blinking an eye. Dress in that office was also pretty casual which I enjoyed too. I also went for a blade every Sunday morning on the Ottawa River Parkway.
- Was driving 500 miles from Ottawa to Windsor Friday after work to see Dave, and driving back Sundays. That's 15 hours of driving in the span of under 3 days and we both did it fairly often.
- Was finally able to set a wedding date for us knowing where we were going to be living. Dave got a job almost exactly midway between the cities were living in, and I found a job a couple of weeks later in the same city. I started at looking at houses to rent, and, after we found none, houses to buy.
So far this year I...
- Have finalized most of our wedding plans and have not too many days left, bought my wedding dress on e-Bay
- Got out of a really crappy job that made me dread going to work and that I absolutely hated, and landed one I'm actually enjoying (most days).
- Stripped most (but not all) of the wallpaper in the front hallway, along the stairs, and upstairs hallway but can't get it all because we need to borrow a ladder.
- Had my first instance of being accused of racism. Nothing like an angry mob of people blaming you personally for things out of your control in the justice system. Once people have accused you of that there's very little to do to change their minds. I just argued for my clients (their friends) and listened to them sucking their teeth at me and others in court before the officers threw them out.
- Yelled at the porch monkeys down the street to not mow their lawn while drunk at 1 in the morning. Asshats.
- Felt a bit better and think I ran a couple of good bail hearings and didn't get accused of racism. (yeah it still kinda stings because as far as I'm concerned nothing could be further from the truth)
- Registered for some china. Hoo-ee the excitement here never stops!
- Dropped my stupid birth control pill which skittered across the floor to an unknown location. I looked for it for 20 minutes and gave up.
- Have unwound from a long week at work
- Get the house cleaned cause it's a disaster area
- Think about getting flowers finalized for the wedding along with a guest list
- Figure out what to get my sister for her graduation and troll through the mall for a dress for my mum to wear to my wedding that will show off how cute she is!
- Call an electrician to do upgrades to our house
- Get married and attend 7 other weddings for friends. I'm in two of them. Last weekend I picked out my bridesmaid dress for Sara's wedding which I think is super cute.
- Have painted the house and maybe even have a new kitchen put in to replace the current ugly one.
- Have the cool neighbour down the street come and re-do our hardwood floors
3 comments:
Dude, this brought back such memories - and it's not even my life! Excellent post. You let those porch monkeys know who's boss.
Love that dress! So much better than the ones I've worn for weddings in the past.
Good meme. I'm glad you took the challenge.
roro: I scared the hell outta dave when I yelled. I was L-O-U-D. Jackasses! Who the hell mows their lawn at 1am!?
Mrs. Chicky: I thought so too. I'm so short long gowns tend to make me look like a weenie. I'm hoping I'll be able to wear this one a few times afterward.
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