I'll be the first to tell you. I'm quirky. I like to think delightfully so, but quirky just the same. I'm silly, goofy, unique, different, interesting (in that "She's....um...interesting." sort of way). I've always embraced these things about myself, and at times even developed that in myself. I always figured, "Hey, you're never gonna be JUST like everyone else. Might as well be unique!"
But here's what I've discovered since becoming an adult - through college friends, through my husband, through my mommy friends, etc. - sometimes I'm downright WEIRD.
(Stop laughing!)
I mean weird in the same way every single person is weird to everyone else. We didn't all grow up the same way with the same rituals, words, people, places. We are all at least a little bit different from everyone else.
Don't believe me? Think about all the "roommate issues" you had to work out when you first got married (or got your first roomie). WHY IN THE WORLD would you make the bed like that? HOW CAN YOU POSSIBLY think it makes sense to put that there? DID IT NEVER occur to you to do this? When you spend time outside of the house you grew up in, you find out that all the things you assumed everyone did just like you... NOT so much!
In my family, most of our uniqueness is in the form of terminology. We have weird phrases like "Calling the tree" at Christmas (passing out the presents - aka CALLING the names on the gift tags - which my roomie and boyfriend in college mocked endlessly by mockingly patting their legs and saying, "Here tree. Come here, boy!"). But I also discovered (only after constantly hearing the hubs say, "WHAT did you just say?!?") that my parents - Diddy especially - were pretty keen on making up words. We measure things in "a skosh", have things "tump over", and sign cards, letters, and now even blogs with "Love & Shipoopies".
That's why I laughed a bit the first time I heard a cable commercial touting the ability to watch a show you record on any TV in your house.
The guy begins asking about each TV in his house and eventually gets to, "I can watch it in the closet?"
"You have a TV in your closet?!?"
"Why? Is that weird?"
It rings of my reality all too clearly. :)
Even MORE fun is finding the weirdness in others. Heck, the first morning in my house in college (my first morning NOT living with my parents), my roomie finished her cereal, then went to dump the milk (and any leftover bits and pieces) out the back door.
I said, "WHATINTHEWORLDAREYOUDOING?!?!"
To which she replied, "Dumping my cereal into the yard. Why? Is that weird?"
"Only if you want your first breath of outside air each day to smell like soured milk."
So Saturday night, I was having dinner with two separate families of friends who happened to both come to the ATL on the same night. We were all chatting when someone mentioned how long T's hair would be if I hadn't ever had it cut.
"Umm, she's not gotten a haircut."
Newlywed friend: "Well not cut, but trimmed."
Me: "Umm, nope."
Newlywed friend: "Really? Not even her bangs?"
Me: Silent, wide-eyed, head shaking
Mother of THREE friend: "REALLY?!?"
Me: "Umm...um...um..." (Thinking to myself, "Why? Is that weird?")
So come on! FESS UP!!! What weirdness lurks in YOUR closet? What things did you think were perfectly normal until you stepped out of the safety of your own home?
EVERYONE's got a little wierd in there somewhere.
Oh, IS IT weird that my almost 2 year old (ohmygoshcanshepossiblybeturning2injustoveramonth) has never had a haircut?
Love & Shipoopies,
Leslie
7 comments:
I was 20 yrs old before I realized that not everyone breaks into song while others are talking because they used a phrase or the title from a song. It took maybe another year to get it through my head that not only is that NOT delightful to everyone around, it can actually be annoying to some.
So.....i eat ketchup on my grilled cheese. i thought everyone did it until my husband told me how gross it was. I mean he eats Spam so what does he know???
side note about the haircuts....nothing weird about not having a haircut at 2. Please see what can happen with (at home) haircuts on my latest blog. :)
Weirdness...I am pretty sure it is in me somewhere, but I would have to ask my teenagers. Because off that top of my head I can't think of anything, but I am sure they could think of a hundred! Weird, huh? ;-)
I was just thinking about this same thing last night when talking to a friend about what she could give to another friend who is struggling with Cancer...I asked if she had any quirks, like we did. She goes what do you mean?
I said, Oh, like how I absolutely love anything zombie and will watch a movie that ends in an exclamation point just because it does and should be exemplery...or how you like movies where really little things become blown up for some bizarre reason (aka GIANT bugs/animals/etc).
So yes we are weird...and happiily so. I apparently am weird for calling the shopping cart a buggy...
As for a two year old whose never had her haircut...Anna is in the same boat, I think it's because their hair is curly that they haven't had a haircut...it hides the fact that it's uneven. Kaelyn had had a haircut by now...but it was to even out a mullet.
Whitney...
I eat onion on mine...and use season all on the outside where the butter is...delicious!
My first child didn't get hers cut until her second birthday. There was no reason. No hair to cut. LOL
I can't think of weirdness. I like to buy things on a whim and then return them. Not all the time just sometimes..when I feel guilty about buying. Yeah, that is weird.
i take both of my contacts out at the same time.
My family spends hours opening Christmas presents one at a time and takes a lot of joy in watching someone open the gift we selected. I never thought this was weird until I spent Christmas with my husband's family who takes no joy in exchanging gifts and it's over in about 10 minutes.
My family breaks into song on a regular basis (none of us are talented musically) and I never considered it that weird until I read someone else's comment :)
I think Tucker's hair looks adorable! I have been thinking about a haircut for Sarah Graves, but my Mom says that would be weird.
Post a Comment