I was talking to a male friend of mine today and I started wondering why our conversations are always so enjoyable. True to form, I needed to do a little research to answer this question and the following epic text was born:
"I figured out why you're so damn enjoyable to talk to. Being a nerd, I started puzzling over personality types and it turns out that we are each other's natural match on the Myers Briggs scale. I am an INFP (introverted intuitive feeling perceiving) and you are an ENFJ (extroverted intuitive feeling judging). We both represent some of the rarest personality types IN THE WORLD. You're around 2% and I'm around 3%. I think I've only gotten to know one other ENFJ in my life. Jesus, run the numbers. Let's say I meet roughly 1,000 new people a year. Of those, approximately half are male, leaving about 500. Of the 500, 2% are my natural personality match, meaning 10 individuals. Of those ten individuals, how many are likely to be physically attractive? To me, a man needs to be over 6 feet tall, which is approximately 14% of the population. So out of the ten dudes a year, only 1 of them is likely to be tall enough not to be considered a midget in my book. Factor in that only 30% of the male population is between 25 and 44, and that comes out to meeting 0.3 ENFJ dudes approximately my age and in my acceptable height range per year which translates to maybe once every three years. Plus, I actually have to engage this person in conversation long enough to figure out if I can stand him. Do you see the statistical odds there?? Every day I have less than one tenth of a percent chance of meeting my "perfect match". And I didn't even consider ugliness (but that was because I can't find any solid statistics on fugly). The good news for you is that you might meet 15 INFP women in a year but the bad news is that only 10% of the population is in your target demographic of 18-24. You are, in fact, more likely to get lucky with an older woman. I find that FUCKING HILARIOUS."
It's especially hilarious because the only reason I don't snap this particular dude friend up like a hot buttered croissant is that he is way too young for me. Oh the irony.
Saturday, February 15, 2014
Friday, February 14, 2014
Frosting
There is frosting on everything. I mean everything. Ocean turned 6 and we held our first real birthday party. Can we talk about fiascos? I made pool noodle light sabers. We had a piñata. A piñata for the love of god. In my living room. I consumed adult beverages. I shopped and slaved. I cleaned and decorated. I decluttered. I fretted. And afterwards I collapsed. Somehow, through the days of preparation, party frenzy, and severe post-festive malaise, two dozen cupcakes grew legs and dropped their greasy, sugary calottes all over my house. I picked up my glasses today, and wiped them on the hem of my shirt, an habitual gesture that signifies getting down to business. I put them on my face only to discover that I was peering through a vanilla cream haze. Whether this nefarious smear originated on the glasses or the shirt is anyone's guess. I just know that the frosting is everywhere.
Also, for your viewing pleasure, here is a Lego dude stuffed down the hole of a pool noodle light saber (edited to add that no such picture exists since the light saber mysteriously disappeared...to the goat pen? the dog's digestive tract? behind the dryer aka no man's land???). The raw materials for said light sabers were harder to find than an ear bone in a sand box, given that it's mid-February. Do Chinese slave factories go on toxic foam noodle production hiatus for the winter? Or are the assholes who own Target just sitting on a stockpiled hoard of pool noodles to torment overly-ambitious moms who bite the bullet and drag their asses from big box store to big box store in the fruitless pursuit or joyful childhood memories?
To make up for how stressful the whole situation was, I give you a photograph of a five year old putting a grown man in an arm bar. Gleefully, I might add. It always makes me giggle, anyway.
Also, for your viewing pleasure, here is a Lego dude stuffed down the hole of a pool noodle light saber (edited to add that no such picture exists since the light saber mysteriously disappeared...to the goat pen? the dog's digestive tract? behind the dryer aka no man's land???). The raw materials for said light sabers were harder to find than an ear bone in a sand box, given that it's mid-February. Do Chinese slave factories go on toxic foam noodle production hiatus for the winter? Or are the assholes who own Target just sitting on a stockpiled hoard of pool noodles to torment overly-ambitious moms who bite the bullet and drag their asses from big box store to big box store in the fruitless pursuit or joyful childhood memories?
To make up for how stressful the whole situation was, I give you a photograph of a five year old putting a grown man in an arm bar. Gleefully, I might add. It always makes me giggle, anyway.
Thursday, February 13, 2014
In My Head
It's where I live. I can't seem, most of the time, to break out of this eggshell. I'm all caught up in here, living my life in a distracted half-gesture. You know what I mean? Like a mom waving her hand distractedly at her son when she's having some dull adult conversation on the phone. That simile just confused me. Am I the mom? The son? The phone? The caller? See what I mean?
What, then, am I?
1. Mother
2. Maker
3. Scientist
4. Lost
5. Distracted
This list could go on forever but it's sort of the worst to listen to people describe themselves, and infinitely more entertaining to watch people be themselves. That's an area in which I excel. I will, to my very dying day, be unerringly myself.
It wasn't always that way. I'm thinking back to many times when I've tried really damn hard to be someone else. I get this visceral sense-memory of a junior high birthday party for a girl named Liberty. Her neighborhood was not-so-great in my child eyes and the fig tree in her front yard was decorated with tissue paper ghosts. She was older so it was a boon to be invited to the party. I remember going to the party and feeling so horrendously out of place that I wanted to climb out of my skin. The people were nice, the kids were friendly. We got some serious MC Hammer dance-offs going, but I just felt completely not myself. I sat on a lava rock planter and tried really really hard not to judge. I thought it was stupid. I didn't want to go inside where the girls were gossiping and trying on womanhood like an over-sized bra. I was more inclined to play legos with the little brother but I knew it wouldn't do at such an esteemed social event.
There was an overweight boy sitting on another planter dressed inexplicably in some kind of Hitler uniform. I guess it must have been a costume party but I don't think I was dressed up. However, given my peculiarities, I wouldn't be the least bit surprised to discover that I was dressed as a coal miner (yup, wore it to school), one of the lost boys from Lord of The Flies (favorite novel in 6th grade. wow. healthy), Indiana Jones (always a good way to establish gender identity at this awkward age), or some variation of a cat (simply because there was a pair of cat ears on a headband that resurfaced occasionally throughout my childhood). I decided to strike up conversation with the awkward boy since I always got along well with boys better than girls and he was guaranteed not to have a conversation about periods with me. Going into that talk, I just knew it was going to be terrible.
Now, at this moment maybe you are expecting that this is going to be a lovely story of self-discovery and the prudence of withholding judgement of awkward, pudgy teens because they turn out to be lovely and grow up sensitive and work for Green Peace. Spoiler alert. It's not. I was right. This kid absolutely sucked. He was weird and socially lame, not terribly clever, less than politically astute (hello, Hitler costume), and generally a terrific bore. But this is where it gets weird. I consciously decided, in the middle of our stilted and terrible conversation, to simply not be myself. I decided that I was going to make this awkward, boring kid feel incredibly comfortable by being just like him. When I think back on this idea (I was, what, 12?) it makes me think that maybe I'm a sociopath. It wasn't like I didn't know what I was doing or that I felt uncomfortable and was seeking a friend. I felt bored and looked for an experiment. "Can I convince this kid that I am a boring kindred spirit?" I asked myself. You already have my answer.
I spent the whole evening completely engrossed in this game, to the exclusion of everything else at the party. i didn't try to make friends, I didn't engage with the birthday girl, I didn't use the time to jockey for social advancement. Instead, I decided to wholeheartedly pursue my role as socially awkward self-conscious girl at the party and convince this boy of my identity. The weird thing is that it worked. Completely. It was one of the first experiences I had with the concept of re-creating identity. I realized that I could be whoever I wanted to be, that identity is a choice. Given the right circumstances, you can chameleon yourself into the good graces of any social situation and IT WORKS BOTH WAYS. You can go up or down the social ladder at whim and people will accept whatever you present to them.
Upon reflection, I recognized a few things:
1. Incipient sociopathic inclinations
2. Incipient scientific inclinations
3. 1 and 2 are definitely not mutually exclusive and may, in fact, covary
4. This might be why I'm so adamantly "me"
All that being said, welcome to the blog.
What, then, am I?
1. Mother
2. Maker
3. Scientist
4. Lost
5. Distracted
This list could go on forever but it's sort of the worst to listen to people describe themselves, and infinitely more entertaining to watch people be themselves. That's an area in which I excel. I will, to my very dying day, be unerringly myself.
It wasn't always that way. I'm thinking back to many times when I've tried really damn hard to be someone else. I get this visceral sense-memory of a junior high birthday party for a girl named Liberty. Her neighborhood was not-so-great in my child eyes and the fig tree in her front yard was decorated with tissue paper ghosts. She was older so it was a boon to be invited to the party. I remember going to the party and feeling so horrendously out of place that I wanted to climb out of my skin. The people were nice, the kids were friendly. We got some serious MC Hammer dance-offs going, but I just felt completely not myself. I sat on a lava rock planter and tried really really hard not to judge. I thought it was stupid. I didn't want to go inside where the girls were gossiping and trying on womanhood like an over-sized bra. I was more inclined to play legos with the little brother but I knew it wouldn't do at such an esteemed social event.
There was an overweight boy sitting on another planter dressed inexplicably in some kind of Hitler uniform. I guess it must have been a costume party but I don't think I was dressed up. However, given my peculiarities, I wouldn't be the least bit surprised to discover that I was dressed as a coal miner (yup, wore it to school), one of the lost boys from Lord of The Flies (favorite novel in 6th grade. wow. healthy), Indiana Jones (always a good way to establish gender identity at this awkward age), or some variation of a cat (simply because there was a pair of cat ears on a headband that resurfaced occasionally throughout my childhood). I decided to strike up conversation with the awkward boy since I always got along well with boys better than girls and he was guaranteed not to have a conversation about periods with me. Going into that talk, I just knew it was going to be terrible.
Now, at this moment maybe you are expecting that this is going to be a lovely story of self-discovery and the prudence of withholding judgement of awkward, pudgy teens because they turn out to be lovely and grow up sensitive and work for Green Peace. Spoiler alert. It's not. I was right. This kid absolutely sucked. He was weird and socially lame, not terribly clever, less than politically astute (hello, Hitler costume), and generally a terrific bore. But this is where it gets weird. I consciously decided, in the middle of our stilted and terrible conversation, to simply not be myself. I decided that I was going to make this awkward, boring kid feel incredibly comfortable by being just like him. When I think back on this idea (I was, what, 12?) it makes me think that maybe I'm a sociopath. It wasn't like I didn't know what I was doing or that I felt uncomfortable and was seeking a friend. I felt bored and looked for an experiment. "Can I convince this kid that I am a boring kindred spirit?" I asked myself. You already have my answer.
I spent the whole evening completely engrossed in this game, to the exclusion of everything else at the party. i didn't try to make friends, I didn't engage with the birthday girl, I didn't use the time to jockey for social advancement. Instead, I decided to wholeheartedly pursue my role as socially awkward self-conscious girl at the party and convince this boy of my identity. The weird thing is that it worked. Completely. It was one of the first experiences I had with the concept of re-creating identity. I realized that I could be whoever I wanted to be, that identity is a choice. Given the right circumstances, you can chameleon yourself into the good graces of any social situation and IT WORKS BOTH WAYS. You can go up or down the social ladder at whim and people will accept whatever you present to them.
Upon reflection, I recognized a few things:
1. Incipient sociopathic inclinations
2. Incipient scientific inclinations
3. 1 and 2 are definitely not mutually exclusive and may, in fact, covary
4. This might be why I'm so adamantly "me"
All that being said, welcome to the blog.
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