Five things about me . . .

 No, you are not imagining things.  That IS a pile of ground beef.  Ground beef was something which I absolutely HATED when I was a child.   I am not sure why.  I think it was a combination of things.  My mother usually bought the cheapest she could buy and so it was filled with little bits of bone and gristle which always seemed to end up on my plate.   As soon as anything like that touches my teeth or gets into my mouth I am gagging, so anytime it was on the menu my eating experience was an exercise in trying not to throw up.  I remember one time I actually did and got into really big trouble for it.  It was bad enough when it was on it's own . . .  blech  (meatloaf, burgers, etc.)  . . .  but when it was mixed into something like a cottage pie or macaroni/spaghetti, etc.  I was off to the races.  I became an expert at picking it out.   At the end of mealtime there would be a little pile of it sitting on the corner of my plate.  I can remember being made to sit at the table for hours in front of a congealing pile of horrible ground meat, having been told I was not allowed to leave until it was gone.  I tried hiding it under my plate and under the carpet in the dining room.   The plate thing didn't work at all and was discovered right away.  The carpet thing worked for a short . . .  at least until my mother vacuumed, which would have only been a couple of days if that.   Finally I discovered that I could drop it down the cold air duct in the corner of the dining room.   That never did get discovered.  RESULT!  Eventually my parents decided that if I really hated it that much I didn't have to eat it and I was happy about that.  I do eat it now, but I only buy extra lean and we don't have it very often.  The texture of it mixed into things still bothers me, but I can tolerate it once in a blue moon and I am still an expert in picking it out of things.

Yes, that is the first of a five things about me!  You know the drill!



I really wanted to be able to take dance lessons when I was a girl.  My parents couldn't afford it.   I don't blame them.  I couldn't afford to pay for dancing lessons for my own girls when they were growing up either.   My mother had a book in the bookcase that was a learn to dance manual.    All of the steps were there on the pages as little feet, each labelled right foot, left foot . . .  and there were arrows telling you which way to put which foot.   I spent hours devouring that book trying to teach myself how to tap dance.  I laugh about it now.   As if you could learn how to dance by reading a book  . . . never mind.  I got my mother's moneys worth out of the book many times over.  I think I was a somewhat peculiar child.



I was a fairly confident child until I was about 3/4 of the way through the year that I was ten.  It seems that all of a sudden it changed.   I don't know what triggered it . . .  unless it was me starting to have my period which happened that year.   I can remember coming home from school for lunch and there it was and thinking I was dying because nobody had bothered to tell me about anything yet.   I am sure my mother was just as shocked.  Or it could be the fact that my sister was very ill and bed ridden and my grandfather died and I was faced with the facts of mortality.   Or it could be the fact that my father had a nervous breakdown which I witnessed.  Or it could just be that I suddenly became shy and withdrawn.  I don't know  . . .  may hap a combination of all of those things. By the time I hit thirteen I was as shy as a church mouse and that was that.   I lacked confidence totally in myself and my abilities.   I spent most of my life being that way.  Being shy and lacking in confidence led me to making very poor choices for most of my life.  I may come across as having lots of confidence now and being not so shy . . .  but I really am still shy to a degree.  I am a heck of a lot more confident in myself however and that helps me to cope well with the shyness.  I still am not comfortable in a large crowd of people.



I got my first bicycle when I was about seven years old.   I saved up most of the money for it by cleaning telephone booths in the PMQ area of the Military Base we were living on at the time.  I used to get $1 a week which was a lot of money for a six and seven year old, but it all added up.   I was also able to buy myself a red plastic covered wire basket for my bicycle and a horn which had a propeller on the front of it.  My father taught me how to ride it in our back yard.   I can remember him running up and down the yard with his hand on the back of the seat while I peddled my little legs off.   Eventually he let go and I had ridden quite a ways before I realized it.  That was it.  I was off and running.   In the non-snow months I rode my bicycle every day.  It was my best friend.  I rode it everywhere.  You didn't have to worry about anyone stealing your bike back then, at least not very much.   People were more honest I guess.  I have not been on a bicycle in years.



It was memories of my bicycle riding days that inspired me when I painted this wee girl.  That and Mindy Gledhills song Little Red Bike.



I am afraid of heights.  I always get vertigo when I am up high and I feel like I am going to fall.   I also feel like jumping, but I think that is a common thing.  I also am a bit claustrophobic. I don't like to be down under the ground or in cave type of situations.  I can remember going on a tour of some mines one time and I got on the elevator to go down into the mine, but I had to get off because the thought of going thousands of feet beneath the earth made me want to pass out.  Even now I can think of nothing worse.   When I think about the thousands of young children in Victorian days that were made to go down in mines or up in chimneys  . . .  I could just cry for the thought of how horrible it must have been for them.  I think we all have a tendancy to romanticize the past . . .  but I think that it was really only good for people who had money.  If you did not have money (and I doubt that I would have) it was probably a horrible hand to mouth existance.  I am blessed to have been born when I was.

And that's five things about me for this week.    Sooner or later I will run out of things to tell you or begin repeating myself, but until then . . .  you're stuck with it.☺  I hope you don't mind too much.

A thought to carry with you through today  . . .

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The most common way people give up their power
is by thinking they don't have any.
~Alice Walker
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 I'm talking sandwiches in the kitchen today.


 Have a great Thursday!  Don't forget . . .

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And I do too!