30 Fun and Fabulous Facts

In celebration of my recent birthday I thought I would change up this week’s blog post and do something a little lighter in tone.

30 things you may or may not know about me (one for each year I’ve been alive!):

1. I have 5 piercing in one ear--3 of which my mom pierced for me. I only wear three of the five.
2. I have a serious fear of heights and don’t actual like roller coasters.
3. One my favorite meals is my dad’s mac-n-cheese (but my mom taught him how to make it!).
4. I talk to Trini as if she is a person and as a result I’m pretty sure it’s made her a very neurotic dog.
5. I have a fixation with being strikingly unique—from my clothes, to my attitude, to my hair style, to my writing style—I blame it on being a twin and always having to share everything (DT and I shared almost everything until we were 21 from friends to jobs to schools).
6. I’m obsessed with reality TV. I have no idea why.
7. I had an atrial septal defect repaired when I was four, and I have a moon shaped scar that spans from under my arm to the other side of my boob. Being a swimmer and wearing tiny little competitive bathing suits people could always see my scar, so I used to make-up stories about how I got it instead of telling the truth.
8. I have another scar on my belly that’s in the perfect shape of an “L” that JT gave me with scissors.
9. I am extremely close with my mom, dad and brothers and talk to them several times a day (I think my parents actually get sick of me calling!).
10. My one real vice is Dt. Coke…ok pop in general. In college JP and I could go through a cube of Pepsi in less than a week (she’s the only person besides JT that I know has the same love affair with pop).
11. I only drink pop with a straw (something I learned from JP!).
12. Sometimes I put on musicals just so I can sing along (a personal favorite is “Suddenly Seymour”).
13. I dated the same guy on and off for over ten years. He was my first boyfriend and at one point I was sure I would marry him. Funny how life works out.
14. I hate dressing up for Halloween but love decorating for it (backwards I know).
15. When I get really, really angry I cry. When other people cry, I cry. But other than that I don't really cry.
16. One of my best friends, J(L)M, and I became friends in first grade when we came to school wearing the exact same outfit right down to the same shoes. Throughout our friendship we have shown up to places in the same outfits without knowning we'd done it. Our friendship has stood strong for over 20 years.
17. I played the piano for 17 years and minored in it in college but I haven’t really played it since I was 26.
18. I love lilacs.
19. My family in Atlanta is very special to me, and we always spend some part of the summer together.
20. When I was little I was sure I would be married by the time I hit 30 and have a child named Anne Elizabeth Suzan Taczak-XXX. Poor child would have had nightmares about her name.
21. I occasionally have a moment of panic where a tiny voice in my head screams “you won’t be able to finish your dissertation.”
22. I love fashion and learned most of what I know from my mom.
23. I once won a push-up contest where I did 115 push-ups (true story ask JP or DT…afterwards I went to a frat party and challenged a guy who was annoying me to a push-up contest and beat him. I truly am no longer that competitive nor can I do that many push-ups).
24. I love shoes, bags, and scarves and own almost 50 pairs of shoes (mostly Steve Madden and Jessica Simpson’s because they are the only shoes that tend to fit me—I have an unusually small foot and even smaller heel), 30 scarves, and 20 bags.
25. When I was sophomore in high school I got a B in English because I sat and unashamedly flirted with the boy behind me instead of paying attention. I never got a B in English again.
26. I go to church every Sunday.
27. I hate it when people mention my height and have a tendency to want to drop kick someone when they mention it. Yeah, I get it. I’m short. Get over it already.
28. Sometimes when I’m angry, frustrated or upset with someone I have vividly detailed conversations with them in my head. One time a person that I was having a “conversation” with came up behind me and could tell something was wrong and that it was directed at her. Now I try and keep those conversations in the shower so my body language doesn’t project what I’m thinking (I’ve been told I can have loud body language).
29. I never read the Harry Potter books but I love all the movies.
30. I believe in standing up for what you believe in even if no one else around agrees with you but I don't believe in arguing with someone who's stupidly putting down your beliefs because that person has already shut out/off anything you would say (think about it...).

I can only hope and pray that my 30s are as entertaining, enlightening, and fabulous as my 20s were!

Big A, Little A what begins with A?

Sometimes the questions are complicated and the answers are simple. Dr. Seuss

Well, ain’t that the truth, Seuss.

That Dr. Seuss had wisdom to spare and as another week begins I find myself drawn to some of my favorite Dr. Seuss quotes. I grew up with Dr. Seuss—we were best buds, if you will—my mom taught my brothers and me to read using many of his books (and if I try I can recite several from memory: Big F, little f what begins with F? Four, Fluffy feathers on a fiffer-fefer-feff!) when we were barely old enough to read. From this began a love affair with words, thus, I’ve been fond of reading and writing ever since. Love affair is very appropriate description (especially given today is Valentine’s Day and all) because the relationship has had its ups and downs—sometimes even failing on me when I needed it most.

Take today. I had an interview with a school that I was very excited about interviewing with. But, I have a cold (yes, I’m sick again…I apparently have a sign on my forehead that says, “open for business—calling all germs”) that has situated itself in my throat and sinuses. I basically coughed my way through a feverish 20min interview (case in point: right in the middle of explaining a key point of my research I had to break for coughing…moment lost). I’m hoping and praying that somehow the search committee heard my main points through the coughing and sniffing but who knows (no one likes a sniffer). Words failed me today because they got caught behind a wall of mucus (gross, I know). I’m still blaming them because I feel if they had really had my back they would have mustered through with a better fight.

Today’s interview I'm appropriately titling as a AYFK? moment.
My mentor (and dissertation head) told a group of us a secret: awhile
ago she was given a slip of paper with words "are you kidding" on them
and was told to pull it out whenever the moment seemed to call for them.
Today was one of those moments only I'd like to re-phrase, "are you [blank]
kidding?!?" (texting purposes AYFK?).

The questions are complicated, yes indeed. How the heck do I get a job? How do I prove to a search committee that I’m the one that they want (because I’m smart, competent, and work really hard—I mean how does one get that across in an interview without seeming too narcissistic)? When do I get off this insanely long and bumpy roller coaster (have a mentioned I hate roller coasters?!?)? And most importantly, “And will [I] succeed?” According to Seuss, “Yes, indeed, yes indeed! Ninety-eight and three-quarters percent guaranteed.” Hm. It’s the other one and a quarter that worries me.

The Facts of Life

You take the good, you take the bad, you take them both and there you have—The Facts of Life.

Some people never learn about the “facts of life” because some people never learn to take the good with the bad. We’re human—we want good all the time—even if we know it’s unrealistic.

A fact:
The Steelers lost the Super Bowl on Sunday, and as saddened as I am by that fact, I still pretty proud of my boys. 2nd in the NFL is none too shabby especially when the critics panned them as having a bad year due to the BR drama. Yes, the boys done well—they done real well.

There's a time you got to go and show, You're growin' now you know about—The Facts of Life.

A fact:
Some people never grow only wanting to wallow around in what might have been instead of what could be. Three of my friends have gotten campus interviews and one of them said to me that he almost didn’t tell me because he knew I’d be upset. I found this to be amusing rather than offensive (luckily) because one thing I’ve learned in the last six months is you can’t wallow. What kind of person would be upset over a friend’s success? Seems silly. No, I’m proud of these three. They are forging ahead and making it work in a very difficult market.

You got the future in the palm of your hands all you gotta do to get you through is understand you think you rather do without, you will never make without the truth—The facts of life is all about you.

A fact:
You gotta take the job market experience as a growing and learning experience otherwise you’re never going to get out of bed in the morning; you’re never going to teach your students anything substantial this semester; and you’re never going to finish your dissertation. I keep learning this fact over and over again. I feel kinda bad for the head of my dissertation (and also my go-to person for advice on just about everything) because I have had the same talk with her repeatedly (of course I have also had the same talk with my mom and dad, but I don’t feel quite as bad because they don’t have any choice in the matter). So, three people I respect tell me over and over again the same thing: to take each interview, each rejection, each stumble and grow from them. And I do—I grow—but sometimes I grow backwards and need to be reminded I do have the future in the palm of my hand…it’s just the future’s a little unclear right now. But who knows what fact of life next week might hold for me.

I'm taking the good with the bad or at least I'm learning to.