My life history, 12 words

Born. I don't remember much about my birth. There are pictures of me swaddled and lying in a banana box, because my parents were too poor to purchase a baby bassinet. Later they inherited a bassinet from a neighbor, and so I did not grow up in a banana box.

School. By the time I was two, we had moved to the house I grew up in. Its back yard was adjacent to the elementary school yard, and my parents installed a gate directly into the soccer field. By age five, I was commuting by foot daily to school. Over seven years, my best friends were Julie, Kelli, Tiffany, and Abby, in that order. I did not like Krystal, and was bullied by another Julie. I was also very jealous of Brittney, in spite of the Nutcracker incident and the gold teddy bear pin.

Junior high.In seventh grade, I moved on to a daily commute on foot up to the junior high school. Mairi and I walked together. What has become of Mairi? I bet Facebook knows.

High school. I think Mairi and I shared a locker when we were sophomores. I had a crush on a boy whose name I forget, in my AP history class. He had longish blond hair, and was older than I. Perhaps if I could remember his name, Tim would be jealous. The next year I loved Nate from a distance. I danced on my toes and it hurt, and wrote for the school newspaper. I also liked John, who also wrote for the school newspaper. But nothing came of any of that. While I thought all my brother's friends were cute, it annoyed me that my friends thought my brother was cute. They did, Bryan. At least two of them wrote something to that effect in my yearbook. And I am only just now confessing. Just think -- you might have had a different story if I had told.

College. I learned after my first quarter in college that there was even more math to be learned than calculus. Imagine that! Even more! I picked up mentors named Anne and Ellen, brilliant women with PhD's, among the very few in their respective departments. I was disgustingly naive, and my memories of myself annoy me. But both mentors put up with me, and helped me find my interests and talents, and develop them. And to find fabulous summer experiences in New York and Berkeley. And last I found my own summer in Neuchatel, because I wanted to speak French.

Love. As a sophomore in college, I kissed a boy with a funny name. A year later, I kissed a boy with a very common name -- you know, the kind that is completely un-google-able. A year later, I kissed Tim, and it was magic. It was actually quite cold. Our first kiss was out of doors, in the month of February. We spent a cold year apart, him in California, me at Northern Wasteland University. It was too cold. I told him in November that he would be marrying me that spring. He complied.

Marriage. I was 22, but not too young. It was nice to be married. I especially liked the part where I didn't have to go to a separate home late at night after an evening together. Also, the pooled rent was cheaper than two single apartments.

California. Remember that summer I spent at Berkeley? I loved it. But Berkeley was not located in a nice neighborhood. However, we took a bus to visit Stanford, which was, in fact, in a very nice neighborhood, and I decided that Stanford would be a very nice place to go to graduate school. Then I chose Northern Wasteland U. But marriage to Tim changed all that, and we both ended up in California, at Stanford. Imagine that! Stanford, however, turned out to be quite expensive. That whole nice neighborhood thing? Drove housing prices out the roof. But I loved it. I loved commuting by foot and smelling fresh cut grass in February. I loved watching palm trees sway in the rain. We biked to church. Loved that, too.

Motherhood. Fifth year of grad school, planned pregnancy. Defended thesis eight weeks before my due date. Gave birth one week after my due date. Child was massive, and remains so to this day. I accepted a job in Texas. Texas? While still pregnant. With the birth, I had three months to recover. And move. And buy a house. And furnish it. Tim had defended his thesis in December, and started a job in February. By May he worked 10 hour days and commuted two. By August we thought we would die. We didn't die. Otherwise, this post would have been shorter.

Texas. We found a newer home in a quiet culdesac. Tim and I could both take the bus to work, him north, me south. The weather in Texas was warm all summer long, and into the spring and fall. My toes were warm from March to November. Just think of that! To the displeasure of visiting grandmas, we kept the thermostat set at 83 degrees in July. Winters were harder, with ice storms and freak thunderstorms and torrential rain. We bought a weather radio, to wake us up in the event of an approaching tornado, so that we could hide out in the bathroom. ? Alas, our tub was made of fiberglass. Good thing the tornado never came through. We would not have survived. And again this post would have been shorter.

England. We spent just one year in England, but a defining year. I cycled on the left to work in the mornings. It did in fact rain a lot. It never did, in fact, warm up. Not to 83 degrees. Never to Austin standards. Tim worked from 2pm to 12am, with a dinner break in the middle, and spent his mornings in the local shops sampling the local cuisine. Jonathan's school became progressively worse, although he started out learning French and cooking. He was Joseph in the nativity production at Christmas time.

G.O.D.U. So here we are now in the Mountain West, me happily employed at Good Old Dude's University. I am married to Tim, and we are parents to Jonathan. Jonathan is learning French and cooking at school again. Our tub is made of steel, but chances are extremely low that we would need to use it in the event of a tornado. There are no palm trees or orange groves, which I deeply regret. And my toes are cold from October through May. But our house is perfect, our neighborhood reminds us of Mr Rogers, and food falls out of trees onto our heads regularly. Jonathan has never slept in a banana box.

And so now you know everything about me. Because I copied Tiffany. Although it was Oma's project first.