31 Days to 'Change Your Life' - 3 - "What do I like about myself"" in Dancing on a Blade (September 2019)

Not a whole fucking lot, actually.

Physically:

Um, I’ve got nice fingernails. Usually. They’re broken back right now, but they can grow out almost an inch each on their own, and their color and shape are good. Just, as the tissue ages, I guess, they get a tad brittle and they break. If I gave a shit and clipped them back, they’d be relatively long forever.

I’m a good height. Five foot six and a half means you can wear almost any length pants. Some petite is capri, though, and some longs are too long, but for the most part, anything off the shelf is going to fit fine. Lengthwise. Makes thrift shops great fun.

I could have breastfed an entire daycare. Seriously, my boobs were great. My kids gained weight and grew like weeds. Only a couple ear infections and Adia had pneumonia as a tot, but that was potentially from aspirating her first couple goes at solid food during her first go at stomach flu (brought home by school age cousins, we cohabited.) Of course, no one needs that now. My boobs are still pretty much where they were, though: I don’t always need a bra.

Ability-wise, I suppose

I read very quickly. And I retain ridiculously large amounts. I can have an argument about a book I read once, years ago, and I’m likely to remember points that work with or against your points.

I am incredibly flexible. Or I was. I haven’t tried for some positions in a long time, but I could bend further in every direction than a physical therapist liked to see at 35. I suspect I have Ehlers-Danlos. (I have a strong case. My mother and my daughter have had granulomas removed from bone. I have some structural deformities. My teeth are worse than they should have been. My mother’s are bad, too. The girls’ are getting extra attention from the dentists, to prevent bad things. I have had several “displaced” bone injuries.) I like the flexibility, but I don’t like the pain.

Maybe I like that I can do it even though it hurts?

Otherwise?

Shit, I don’t know. I show up, I do the work, I go home, I sleep.

I like food from every major cultural and ethnic group I’ve had the honor of trying. At least one or two dishes. If I don’t like a thing, I keep trying new things until something works. A lot of people who run ethnic/cultural food businesses like to cook for me, because I’ll eat what they recommend and I usually love it. I’m honorarily Mexican, Korean and Filipino, although I know they’re joking. Still a point of pride. I graduated from “I’ll make it how the customers like it” to “oh, I’m having this for lunch, so you are, too.” That’s fine, I love that. I like getting the “experimental” piroshki from the Ukrainian deli. You have to know the baker, and when she sees you, she’ll pop out and say “this one wants the cabbage ones I made this morning.” (I thought I hated cabbage until I found out what she could do with it.)

I do balance? Kind of? School shit gets done on time. House is not burning down. People are fed. No one has bubonic plague. Is that considered a win?

One of my novels kept a friend up all night once. It was glorious. One day I’d like to do it again.

I didn’t freak out and stop driving this time. See, I tried to get a license at 21, and on one of my first solo drives - he was having a migraine - I turned into a filling turn lane going the other way. I freaked out badly, and I couldn’t get us home because I was shaking and crying.

And then he never let me try again.

But that bitch was eighteen or so years ago, folks. And since I’ve bought vroom-vroom motherfucker, I’ve

-accidentally driven the wrong way on a one way street (we all lived)
-turned into the wrong lanes in parking lots (a fucking zillion times)
-gone into a drive-through backwards (I got confused because a local parking lot has two, one on each side of a through lane. I wanted the through lane.)
-bumped bumpers
-gotten slightly stuck to an idiot who parked too close. (NO FUCKING REGRETS YOU ASS CLOWN.)
-veered wide in traffic because one of the children screamed
-done 75, 80, and 85. Ninety is going to be fun shit

And I’m still going. And I’ve just got the one dent (from the parking-lot ass clown.) Who’s the bitch? I’m the bitch.

I guess I could like that?

Also, I remember enough high-school Spanish (and that was 24 years ago! Or so) to fit into a conversational Spanish class that is NOT remedial. I can still write a basic “about me” paragraph in Spanish. With research and review, I can do better. I can translate a short story in Spanish still, and answer questions about it. That’s not bad. Seriously, Spanish 1 was age 15, 2 was 16 and 3 was 17, and I graduated at 17, before you ask. I’m a year younger than my cohort, because my birthday is Texas’ kindergarten cutoff date. (I went to school in Texas. Graduated in Oregon, though.)

I can keep myself busy. It’s just not always healthy.