I hate small talk. The kind that happens at wedding receptions when you're assigned to a table full of people you've never met, or in church foyers and small town grocery stores. The "so where are you from what do you do where did you go to school and my isn't the weather lovely" small talk that lasts all of five minutes - if that - and discloses absolutely nothing about the kind of person you're talking with. The kind of small talk that's forgotten no more than five minutes later because it's so irrelevant. I love to know and be known. You?
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If we really want to know and be known, then the real question is: Are we willing to share parts of ourselves that leave us a little bit vulnerable? I'm not talking about our skeletons. Everyone has those, and airing them for the general public is generally unpleasant for all parties involved. But sharing the experiences and beliefs that define us as people.
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The other important question is: Am I ready to slow down enough to really see the people that I cross paths with today?
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I got tagged. About ten times. You've probably been tagged too. Slightly begrudgingly, because it felt a little like I was giving in to someone's demands (sometimes I'm still a 13 year old black sheep at heart), I wrote a list of 25 random things about myself and posted them on Facebook. Choose to know and be known, right?
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Long blog posts don't get read. [Edit: Long blog posts tend to lose my attention about two paragraphs in - congrats for making it this far.] So I copied the list into the comments section for your perusal there. And since you have the dubious privilege of hearing about me, consider yourself tagged. Just because you can - share a few things that you otherwise would not share, with a few people who you would not normally permit past the small talk check stop.
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1. I get airsick in small planes. I once threw up into my dad's hands (I was in denial, but vomit doesn't really wait for consent, so it‘s a good thing my dad has quick hands and can fly a Cessna without using them). Flights were defined as "one-baggers" or "two baggers".
2. I love hats and toques, and I practically danced on the day that my aunt gave me two Spitz hats. But they’re awkward colors, so I rarely wear them.
3. I’m directionally challenged. But I hate being treated like I have no idea where I’m going. Just give me good directions and let me be. Extensive experience has made me very capable of getting lost and finding my way back again.
4. I always wanted to play the flute. My band teacher said I had to choose between the trombone and the clarinet. I quit the clarinet a year later, and still wonder… what if?
5. I can change the oil, air filter, headlights, brake lights, and tires on my car, and have had some practice on the brakes.
6. I don’t like letting someone else do for me what I can do for myself, but I’m trying to let them because my friend Heidi told me that love needs to be given and received, and I should learn how to do the latter. She’s right.
7. I love travelling alone. It makes me feel strong and capable, and allows me the freedom to explore at my own pace. With that said, I was incredibly grateful when I found on arriving in Seoul that my friend Des would be living a mere two minutes walk from my apartment.
8. While attending a Torchbearer Bible School, I shared a devotion using Simon and Garfunkel’s “Cecelia” as an illustration. I can’t blame the shell-shocked “that-was-totally-inappropriate” look on their faces (and yours). I still love that song.
9. Garlic cloves and hot red peppers were a fascination to me as a child, and I begged my mom to allow me to taste them. She consented on the hot red peppers (I wore yoghurt around my lips for a couple hours). She said no to garlic cloves, but I did it anyways... and got busted for obvious reasons. I thought it tasted all right.
10. My life plan at age 8 was as follows: marry the man of my choice (I had a list of the top ten candidates), go back to Canada and live on a ranch with horses and lots of animals, eating apples and pears.
11. My life plan at age 18 was as follows: ward off all marriage proposals from greasy construction guys, stay single and go back to Africa for the rest of my life.
12. My current three year plan for age 28: live on a ranch with horses, eating tropical fruit from Africa. I no longer have a top ten list, and in all likelihood, my three year plan will take more like eight years, and should include a couple years in Africa for good measure.
13. I have an eight year plan. Haven’t updated it in about five years though.
14. I need to be a risk taker. I crave stepping out into the unknown. But I’m afraid of risk and I need someone to give me a kick in the pants to get out there and do it.
15. I’m learning to hear God’s voice. Someday maybe it will come as easy as breathing.
16. Being alone is refreshing for me. It’s often when I hear God best.
17. Many of my pets have died gruesome deaths. Notably - Reepicheep, my hamster, was roasted in the furnace. Oomps, my mongoose, was thrown to the dogs by someone who thought he was not at all nice. Black Beauty, my chicken, died of the March disease that hits the African chicken population. The locals trashed all her nearly hatched eggs and told me they were "no good".
18. I once hid a hamster (Reepicheep) in my closet for a month because pets were not permitted in dorm rooms. He became totally disoriented by the perpetual night and ran on his wheel 24-7.
19. I once ate fresh and still-writhing octopus. He tried to crawl off the table, and clung to the chopsticks, so I stunned him in hot sauce before biting down hard so the suction cups couldn’t get a hold on my teeth. This was not one of my pets, and I do not count it among the aforementioned gruesome deaths.
20. I have a debilitating fear that I'm not normal. Alternately, I'm afraid that I'm just like everyone else.
21. I wish I could call myself a photographer, a painter, a writer. But in the absence of such talent and/or experience, I guess I just love capturing beauty, emotion, and truth on film, with pen and paper, or on a canvas. So I secretly blog and hang my art work along with the kids’ at the youth shelter where I work.
22. When people ask me where I’m from, the following questions automatically run through my mind… “Do you mean where I was born? Where I currently live? Where I’ve lived for the longest? Where my family currently lives? Where my family originally came from? Where I feel most at home?”
23. I feel deeply, and I am always thinking. If I check out in the middle of a conversation and give you the blank stare, it’s because I don’t know how to express my thoughts, or don’t know if expressing my thoughts would be appropriate in that situation.
24. I visit www.bags4darfur.blogspot.com almost daily, or several times a day. It has fostered in me an insatiable bag obsession to go along with my hat and toque obsession. I admire people who take what they have in talents and time and give it away.
25. Someday, I will die. And much as I dream of doing great things for God, I’m learning that all He wants from me between now and then is to slow down, fully experience each moment and really see each person, accept my life circumstances as part of God‘s molding and shaping process, and learn how to give and receive His love. "Bless the moment... and the years will be their own blessing. Many of us live life in a rush because it allows us to believe we are going somewhere." -Jacob the Baker-
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