Colleen at Loose Leaf Notes tempted me with this excellent interview meme. She posted the answers to five questions she was asked on her blog and then asked for anyone who was interested in being interviewed by her to leave a comment. I've been desperate for some good questions to think/write about, so I bit, and yesterday morning Colleen emailed me five great questions... here goes!
1. If you could change three things about yourself, what would they be and why? Only three? (Ha ha!) First off, I would like to rid myself of the crippling self-doubt that still rears its ugly head inside of me every now and then. I bought myself a cool sign that says "What would you do if you knew you could not fail?" and it hangs by my desk in my office. I try to remember those words whenever I'm feeling unsure of myself. A second thing I would change would be my rotten allergies... I am allergic to all kinds of things: multiple tree and grass pollens, my kitties, and dust mites, among others. I've cycled through almost every major prescription and over-the-counter antihistamine, and most of them either make me drowsy or stop working after a while. I've had years of allergy shots, too, and while those have helped, I am still allergic to dust mites because my sensitivity to them is so strong that I can't tolerate being injected with them past a certain concentration. I would love to be able to walk outside in the height of spring and not be irritated by pollens and to dust without feeling like I should be wearing a haz-mat suit. When I was a kid, my allergies were so bad that I had an almost-constant stuffy nose and as a result I had to breathe through my mouth. Other kids made fun of me because of it, and to this day I am self-conscious about having to breathe deeply or be winded in front of other people.... having a clear, unobstructed upper respiratory tract would be a wonderful thing. The third thing I would like to do is break myself of the habit of coloring my hair all the time. It's a double-edged sword: if I color it myself, it never lasts as long or looks as good as a salon job, so I spend money and time touching it up and buying shampoo designed to help the color stick around longer. If I have it done in a salon, it costs a small fortune and then I am obligated to return to the salon for root touch ups and such, because I've never been able to reproduce salon-quality color by using a box from CVS Pharmacy. It's been so long since I had my natural color that I can't even remember precisely what it is. While I love the novelty of changing my hair color, now that I have to travel a lot for work I want a 'do that is low-maintenance... no more visible roots, no more browns slowly turning brassy orange, no more blondes going from blonde to dingy brown to green, and no more fried, brittle hair. As Mario Cantone says in those Sunsilk shampoo ads, I guess I need to "get hairapy."
2. Can you write a short poem or limerick about a girl named Jeanne and her shoes? Sorry to disappoint, but limericks generally drive me nuts because when I was little my parents used to constantly recite a limerick about a girl named "Jeannie" (my childhood nickname) who wore an "outrageous bikini." I think I suffer from post-traumatic limerick disorder. I can write a short poem, though. When I think of a short poem, I think of a haiku, so that's what I wrote:
shoes wait in darkness
jeanne digs through the closet
found the perfect pair
3. What do you believe in? How do you explain the nature of reality and your role in it? I believe in karma and in things happening for a reason (although I don't believe in fate -- I have to believe that I can control my life's direction.) I believe that spirituality, religion, or whatever you want to call it should be a private thing between ourselves and our higher power... I feel very strongly about that. For example, when someone I don't know very well invites me to their church or asks me if I've accepted Jesus, to me it's as if they're asking me about my sex life or something like that. In addition, I believe in love, cheeseburgers, existentialism, old houses, roller coasters, baseball, milkshakes, and the Rolling Stones. As for the nature of reality, most of the time I completely forget that it's there and that I'm alive, and then I'll be in the middle of something totally mundane, like bathing or driving to the grocery store and all of a sudden the realization will hit me out of nowhere: "Oh crap, I'm alive! This is all really happening!" So I suppose you could say I am in an almost-constant state of "shock and awe" about reality and the part I play in it. Either that or I'm just really good at staying in the moment.
4. You and I are going to spend the day in Seattle. Where would we go, what would we do, and what would we eat? I would have to take you to the Seattle Center and show you where I rode my first roller coaster. (The roller coaster itself isn't there anymore, but at least I could show you its replacement.) We could visit my favorite vintage clothing store - Rudy's - on 1st and Pine, near the Pike Place Market. We might hang out at the Woodland Park Zoo or the Seattle Aquariaum, two of my favorite elementary school field trip destinations. I'd probably have to show you around the Fremont neighborhood, too, which is more or less Seattle's answer to Haight-Ashbury in San Francisco (or Seattle's Left Bank, as Fremontians refer to their 'hood.) It's full of colorful people and interesting shops, and there's even a troll, a rocket, and a statue of Lenin. I would also have to take you to Archie McPhee, where you will discover all kinds of things you didn't know you needed but suddenly can't live without. For lunch, we can grab fish and chips at Ivar's seafood bar at Pier 54 and maybe take a ferry ride, and for dinner we'll go to the Italian Spaghetti House in Lake City (since my favorite Seattle restaurant, Labuznik, has been out of business since the late 90s.) Finally, I have to point out where we would not go: Starbucks. I'm more of a Tully's fan.
5. Who would play you in a movie? What would the plot be? Would it be a comedy or drama or other? I did a face recognition analysis of myself at MyHeritage, and apparently the actresses I most resemble are Scarlett Johansson and Christina Ricci. I think they are both stunningly beautiful and phenomenal actresses, but I'm not sure I would choose either one of them to play me in a movie. I envision someone like Drew Barrymore or Kate Winslet portraying me. I think either of them could tap into my wackiness and also capture my vulnerabilities better than the other two (and even though Kate is English, she plays American really well - I loved her as Bitsey Bloom in The Life of David Gale: "Mike Wallace with PMS.") Plus, they're both closer to my age than Scarlett and Christina, which I think lends a little more realism and credibility. As for the plot, I'm not sure... my real life is kind of boring, so maybe it will be a story about the things that could have happened in my life. (I've often said that given the chance to live my life over again, I would go back and at every point where I made a major decision, I would do the opposite just to see if things turned out any differently. It sounds like a good movie plot, doesn't it?) Like my real life, though, the movie would be full of comedy and drama and a healthy dose of romance.... hmmm, who should play my leading man, I wonder? Finally, many scenes would have to take place in Coney Island because that is the place where I feel most alive and at home.
Thanks for the questions, Colleen!
Want to play? Here's what to do:
1. Leave me a comment saying, "Interview Me."
2. I will respond by asking you five questions. I get to pick the questions.
3. You will update your weblog with the answers to the questions.
4. You will include this explanation and offer to interview someone else in the same post.
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.
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