LIFE

So this last week was pretty emotionally draining, but what I learned, as my professor had the classmates go around in a circle and talk about anything that was on their minds, is that I am not alone in feeling that way.

We did something called a Family Constellation Paper, which relates to our family constellation (people who we consider to be important aspects of our lives growing up), gender roles, our genogram, and more. This was insightful, but also really depressing. I realized how bleak my life sounds when I spell it out into a paper format. My parents seem self-involved and a little crazy and my sister and I seemed to be totally incompatible, with her being the social and athletic one and me being a major dork. ;) I also learned that I come from a long line of strong and independent woman who seemed to feel they were better off alone. Nice, right? Even my great grandmother, who was my favorite relative by far was a little too independent. She was great though. So then I realized something: No wonder people say I am stubborn, that I refuse to accept help from others, and that I am someone who tends to give up on people who make me sad (not mad, just hurtful). I have a three strikes you're out rule and very few people, if any, have gotten past it. Again, nice, huh? Keep in mind, I don't realize I am doing this, I just figured all of this out this week and sooooo much more!

The thing is, I learned this all by answering a couple of different lists of questions we were given. One list said tings like "Out of your siblings, who was the tallest, prettiest, favorite, most athletic, smartest, hardest working, organized..." You get the point. So then I had to choose. The other one discussed things like "What were the gender roles?" Another asked things like "What was your first memory? What dreams to you remember? etc..." That was fun too. My few memories were bizarre. For example, when I was like five my cat Missy climbed up into the car engine to stay warm, but I didn't learn this until later in life, like adulthood, from my dad. So my memory is of my mom when she had purchased and framed pictures (postcards?) of Siamese cats that were chasing butterflies in fields and my mom told my sis and I that Missy had gone on vacation and had sent us a postcard from her trip. Nice, yet again, huh? Then, when she found another Siamese, she would tell us that cat was Missy. I wonder how many Missy's there were exactly??? Ughh... Okay, well, at least I am not alone; although, the fact that childhood sucks for most everyone offers little comfort. LOL

Oh on a lighter note, and here's the new word of the week I learned from Rachel Maddow:

• Recalcitrant: Head strong, unruly, disobedient