17 posts tagged “qotd”
If you could change your name, what would you change it to?
I used to hate my name. It was so common. So many Jens, Jennys, Jennifers, etc. But my last name is so unusual, and it gets to be such a pain to spell, write out, etc., that frankly after all this time I'll stick with my nice short first name.
If you had to write your autobiography in 6 words, what would you write?
Submitted by mitzie.
"She looked good in hats."
Look, five words!
Here's the proof:
...in cute hats
Please excuse this truly ginormous post. If the past is any indication it'll be another month or so before I post again so this will drop off the first page of your neighborhood in no time.
Are there any people you would not tell if they had food in their teeth or if their zipper were down? Why or why not?
Submitted by Charms.
Yes. Anyone who wouldn't tell me if my skirt was stuck up in the waistband of my underwear.
If you could go back and change one thing you've done in your life, what would it be?
Submitted by Devinoid.
This is going to sound cheesy as hell, and honestly - on a practical level, if this were an actual question of being able to turn back time and make a correction, there are things higher on the list. Not ruining my credit rating, for instance! (Sure, it's getting repaired, but how nice if it had never been that broken in the first place!) But maybe I will put this here, instead, because the question seems almost designed for a wistful answer.
Quite a long while ago (nearly 20 years now), there was this guy that I liked. (Yes, one of those sorts of stories. Sorry! It will be over soon, promise.) As is my wont, I slipped from liking him into serious-overdrive-liking-him, because I'm an intensely emotional person and 20 years ago I was really no good at handling that. (But better than I'd been earlier in life, and I'm better at it now, so as long as it's an improving curve, I reckon I'm good.) I had zero indication that he felt that way about me. In fact I knew him to actively like another girl. It was early in my college career and when I met another guy, I went out with him when he asked. I hadn't been asked out a lot, it was very novel, and I let the flattery of that sweep me up for a month or two. Nearly simultaneously, the Guy I Liked became scarce, fast. This was puzzling, but it made it easier to move past him - he was being a jerk, fine, moving on! The second guy only lasted, as mentioned, a month or two. I never did feel the intense romantic general "wooginess" for him that I felt for the first guy. First guy seemed mostly out of the picture, though, aside from having some mutual friends. Several months after the second guy dumped me, the first guy wrote me a letter. (This was before email was common.)
Oh, he confessed his feelings for me, wrote out song lyrics, lambasted himself for a fool and an idiot for "letting me get away." In my romantic heart of hearts it was all I could have dreamed for - to have someone feeling the same kind of longing for me that I was feeling for him! Imagine! I wrote him a letter right back, the content of which I no longer remember EXCEPT.
I said I'd call him, and I never, ever did.
Now, I don't flatter myself to think I ruined his life. But I set up a lot of guilt and shame for myself, because of my fear and trepidation. And I do flatter myself to think that I made him pretty unhappy for a while. And, of course, I made a promise that I didn't keep, and that stings very much in its own way that has nothing to do with love or romance.
So while, on a realistic level, it would be much better for my life to have not ruined my credit rating, or screwed around in college as much as I did, or not to have done any number of other things...for myself and my well-being, and because I hurt someone I really cared about, I think I'd have that particular action called back in a heartbeat.
When was the last time you laughed so hard you cried?
Submitted by Maraschino.
Probably January 9th, 2008.
I mean I've laughed a lot since then! But until there were actual tears? I don't think so.
2008 is the Year of the Rat. Which animal year were you born in?
What's this? Another chance to mention my birthday? Ahem. I was born in the Year of the Rat as well, 36 years ago! Less than a month 'til my birthday, people. Just sayin'.
Specifically I'm a Water Rat, but when I look up Water Rats on Chinese zodiac websites, the descriptions seem entirely inaccurate. And I just get a mental image of a soaking-wet rat, looking rather put-out.
Have you ever had a premonition about something that came true?
Submitted by Sheri.
Not really. I mean, once in a while when the phone rings I know it's going to be bad news, etc. etc., but I believe those are just little flares of intuition. Sometimes I do have very intense deja-vu wherein I remember, very explicitly, having dreamt about the exact situation I'm in before. But, if this is not just some weird artifact of consciousness, it's utterly useless as a predictor, because I never remember what my dreams "predicted" until I'm standing in the middle of it.
What are 10 things you want to say out loud but you can't?
Submitted by alix.
I've hit "reply" on this QotD to prove a point, which is, QotDs sometimes frustrate me because they're not well-phrased questions. "Can't" isn't really the applicable word here, and I'm not just trying to be a syntax snob. There are all kinds of reasons - valid and invalid - that might keep us quiet where otherwise we would speak, but "can't" applies an actual inability to say the phrase. Internally, nothing keeps me from talking. People who know me in person will tend to agree! Externally, thank goodness, nothing much keeps me from talking either. I was born to good people, in a free country, and have had the privilege and opportunity to do what I want with myself, and to form and voice my own opinions without fear of reprisal. And I'm damned lucky that that's true.
I kind of wanted to answer yesterday's Question and kind of didn't, and I realize that part of that was the way it was phrased. So let me dig up yesterday's.
Do you think real love can last throughout any distance, or will long distance end most relationships?
Now of course it's not like this is a question that is difficult to understand. The fact that the question addresses romantic relationships is implied, of course, and that is part of what stopped me. I've never had a long-distance romantic relationship, so I actually don't feel I can speak to that with much insight. (I have a few ideas, from watching other people's experiences, but bear with me for a moment.) But the question does want you to make a lot of inferences: what "love" is, what "lasting" is, what "distance" is.
If you mean good old fashioned romantic relationships in the most traditional vein, the ones that seem to be on a track to good old fashioned heterosexual marriage and possibly good old fashioned children, statistically, over half of those are doomed anyway. If you've got 50/50 odds, why not try it with distance? Or skip it if you think it'll be too hard? What's the point, right?
If by "lasting," again, you mean forever and ever until death do us part, see above. You can look at your odds as emboldening ("Hey, what have I got to lose! It's like a coin toss!") or intimidating ("I haven't got a prayer. I'm just going to avoid human contact, it's easier that way."). I'm painting with very broad brush strokes here, I realize, but the truth of the matter is that I've felt both of these ways about relationships in the past. (Whether they "lasted" or not, which - since I am not currently married or partnered - they by traditional definition did not.)
And "distance." The definition of this has only gotten broader as the world has gotten "smaller" through the everyday miracles of the Information Age. When I was little and the internet as we know it didn't exist, through school we could sign up for pen-pals. They'd match you up with a little boy or girl the same age as you in another country and you would write letters. I tried this once but whoever-she-was, in Tasmania, did not write back. Anyway, I think that in earlier times than our own, "distance" was not something that came into play immediately in relationships. It sure is easier to meet people you live near, of course, but then life circumstances can change and move one or both of you away, and that's when the "distance" would come in. (Please note I've gone ahead and ceded that, for purposes of this exercise, the "distance" being spoken of is clearly meant in geographic, not emotional, terms.) If you have established a connection and need to move apart, I think that love has every shot that it has when you're still close by. In these times, when people can meet, flirt, court, and commit all without living in the same city, state, or country - well, it's territory I'm less certain of. No matter how eloquent we are in writing or on the phone, how articulately we can express ourselves, there is a portion of interaction that is completely missing when we are not face-to-face.
I'm not saying it can't be done. In my deepest, most romantic heart-of-hearts*, I honestly hope it can be done. It's just that, no matter what - no matter how near or how far - love takes work. It's easy to forget, or ignore.
And that applies to alternate definitions of "love," too. I have a very dear friend who moved from Maryland to Tennessee a few years ago. We've been close since high school, and we've stayed close. But it takes effort and compromise. She's married with a child and one on the way. We have different lives, different concerns. But we take the time to listen to each other's concerns, because even though they are different, we still share a common bond of love for one another, and that includes the stuff that's not as interesting to us as well as the stuff that is interesting. Do I always want to hear how every bit of the pregnancy is going? No. Does she always want to hear me blather about...whatever the hell I'm on about? I'm positive she doesn't. But the point is, it does work, because we both want to make it work.
I'm fairly confident those principles can be applied to romantic relationships as well. I've seen it work and seen it fail spectacularly. Lately I've been more of an "Well you don't know it'll work until you try, do you?" mind, so why not end there?
* Yes, I have one. Really. Down there somewhere. And it is schmoopy as hell.
Shows what letting Vox slide will do - I missed a QotD that I actually wanted to answer. Let me look back for it, hold on. Here it is!
How do you feel about your birthday? Do you look forward to it and remind all your friends, or do you dread it and try to keep it a secret?
Oh, so very much the former. It's not so much "remind all my friends" exactly, as "plan ridiculously far ahead" and "email out early so that people haven't made other plans already." When I was young and much more shy, I didn't like a lot of attention on my birthday, but I never liked no attention on my birthday. There's always the tiny, tiny possibility, however slim, that you might wind up with a free cupcake. And I don't wanna miss out!
But there's a line to walk here. For a long time I think I wanted (subconsciously, and sometimes just plain consciously) really extraordinary things to happen on my birthday, and that gets silly. When you're a kid, in some ways, the world does sort of bend to your whims: cookies or cupcakes at school, not having to do homework for the day, a party with friends and a party with family, all combined to make it feel like your birthday's a week long (and wonder why they don't just make it a national holiday!).
When you're an adult, it doesn't always do that, and it took me a while to stop expecting it to. Basically, in recent years I've made a concerted effort to be more sane about my birthday. My mom always said if you have low expectations you're never disappointed! (Really, she did. We're not exactly cheerleaders in my family.) But I think the best kind of enjoyment on that special day is a relaxed one, with friends.
And maybe cupcakes.
And no, I don't care who knows how old I am either. I just think that's silly. I'll be 36 on March 6, mark your calendars now!
This is a good question because I also like knowing who enjoys the fuss and who doesn't. I also like remembering the actual correct date for friends' birthdays, but that is a whole other story.
What's the best photo you took this year? Show and tell!
Okay, I know, I've posted it before, but come on. It doesn't get much better than that!
Well, not for me, at least. Hee!
