Favorite Kid's Show

"What was one of your favorite television shows as a kid and why?"


My childhood home was different from most of my friends due to the factor that our TV was on almost all the time.  My mother loved to have the TV and it came on first thing in the morning and stayed on until the broadcast day ended.  Yes, kids there was a time when TV was not 24 hours.  We also only had ABC, NBC, CBS, and a local PBS station.  I remember the excitement when we got our first independent TV station.  Ironically, it was the start of this station that would lead to my husband and his family moving to Florida and of course later us meeting up and getting married.  


I don't exactly remember but I know when I was little Captain Kangaroo and Romper Room were two of my favorites.  I also watched Mr. Rodger's Neighborhood.  Sesame Street didn't come out until later.  A little bigger and I watched Electric Company.

My favorite stuff, that I really remember, was during my middle school and high school years and were the shows shown on the local independent station.  The first three that jumped into my mind as shows I regularly watched were Star Trek, Hogan's Heroes, and Big Valley.  I'm not sure why those three were the ones to appeal to me but it certainly shows my eclectic taste even then.  Now what I do find interesting is when I look at my favorite characters in this show they aren't necessary the main stars.  In Star Trek I liked Ensign Chekhov.  He was not a pretty boy, was somewhat more edgy, and who doesn't love an accent.  In Hogan's Heroes, I did like Colonial Hogan and I'm not sure why.  In Big Valley my hands down favorite was Nick Barkley.  The strong, stubborn, roughed, and rough brother.  He was very alpha (before I knew what that was mind you) and while he would do what ever he could to stop an enemy, he was very loyal and caring about people he considered friends or family.  And hey he was a cowboy too.

Of course in old films I also loved Humphrey Bogart and Hans Solo was my favorite Stars War character so I should have seen my love of strong alpha male characters coming.

Playing as A Child

"What kind of indoor and outdoor games did you play as a child?"


When I first saw this prompt I'm thinking oh that would be easy but then when I started thinking about it, it seemed a bit harder.  I mean in school we played the standard school yard stuff like tug-a-war and Red Rover in elementary school. And I really hated middle and high school where you were forced to play team sports for PE.    But I was taking this question more of as at home home voluntary kind of thing.  


So indoors - I liked board games.  Sometimes my mom played with me but I was just as likely to play by myself moving for two players.  I loved playing with my Barbie's at least through middle school.  And I loved to read.  Reading has been my passion for as long as I can remember.

Outdoors - Well I did mention that reading was my passion and I could be found reading outside usually hiding in the Brazilian Pepper Tree in our backyard as doing anything else.  I like to ride my bike and would ride for hours at a time.  I had a half built playhouse in the backyard (that is a story all by itself) and I would imagine all kinds of scenarios up in my head.  Sometimes I put myself in situations of my favorite TV shows where I would be a different character who interacted with my favorites.  Or I would make up my own stuff.  I really was by myself more than I was with others.

When I did play with others it was mostly boys.  My neighbor was lacking in girls.  And the few girls who  moved in didn't stay long and I could not stand how silly they seemed.  Seems I was in training to be the mom of 4 boys.  I was always the pal or one of the guys and by high school that was pretty frustrating but that's the way it was.  We usually rode bikes or played kick ball in my backyard.  Kick ball was the one team sport I seemed to be able to play without embarrassing myself, getting hurt, or pissing off my team mates.  

So there's my complicated answer to the simple question of childhood games.

Surprised to Know

"What is something that people might be surprised to know about you?"


Well I think the most obvious would be that I like to read romantic erotica and have a whole secret identity to support this habit.  I think the rest of the stuff would be pretty much common knowledge stuff that is used for party icebreakers.  Stuff like I'm a Florida native, I saw real snow for the first time at the age of 44 and I had to fly to Norway to do that, I have five kids, I homeschool, and other stuff like that.  I never ran wild in my youth. I didn't have a garage band.  Nothing exciting.

Okay, maybe something that people don't know is that when I was younger I wanted to grow up and mom and have six kids.  I also wanted to be a teacher.  At one time I considering going into the air force.   So how did that turn out.  I did grow up.  I have 5 living children and 1 that was born into heaven for a total of 6.  I ended up teaching my own children.  I gave up on the air force but I have a child who is considering it.  So maybe that's the most interesting thing about me is that the dreams of my childhood actually came pretty close to working out.

Personality Trait

Wow this one is a tuffy.  This is what happens when you let your 10 yo pull a prompt out of the jar and you have to take what she gives you.

"What personality trait of your has gotten you into the most trouble?"


I think that what gets me into the most trouble can often be a positive trait unless you take it too far and that is the trait of wanted to be a peacemaker.  Maybe a more negative name would be people pleaser.  I'm not talking about brown-nosing to get ahead or to make yourself look better in someone else's eyes though.  I'm talking about not wanting others to be upset, to see everyone happy, to have people come together, to not wanting someone else to be disappointed, and/or wanting to make things all okay for the other person.  This tendency leads to saying yes to things you should say no to and that is where I can get into trouble.  It's getting in the middle or trying to fix things so that the normal consequences might be blocked.  It can lead to feeling burned out and burdened.  It can leave me feeling like I'm always giving and not always receiving.  That sentence sounds selfish and self serving but that's not how it was meant.  (Or maybe this is just a example of what I'm trying to say.  I don't want someone to think I'm being selfish or putting myself ahead.)  I will have to be honest here and say that in last few years I've gotten better about taking a stand but it's also easy to fall back into old patterns of behavior as well.  I don't want to large and in charge because frankly that's not how I'm wired and maybe in trying to fix it, smooth it over, or get it done so everyone is happy that I end up taking on the position of being in charge and after a while I'm worn out from the effort.  The reaction to this is to sort of shut down and then not take care of anything even the stuff that is under my "job description".  Not sure of the answer but maybe thinking it through and being more self aware is a good first step.

Tattoos

How do you feel about tattoos?  Do you have any?  If so, what are they and where?  If not, have you ever secretly wanted one?


Until this past years tattoos were really a non-issue for me.  I knew I saw them on people and that the number of people you saw sporting them had seemed to be on the increase but I had only known one person who actually had one.  My dad had a horse on his calf muscle that he had gotten during his stint in the Navy during the Korean war in some Japanese port.  When I was younger he could make the horse appear to move my flexing his leg muscle and I remember thinking it was cool.  After I started reading erotic romance the issue of tattoos came more to the forefront of my thinking.  I started noticing them more on people in real life.  I hope I didn't offend anyone by checking out their ink.  After noticing that one of the dad's of the kids at church seemed to sometimes have his lower arm tattoo covered and sometimes uncovered I had to ask because it didn't seem to be offensive.  He was very happy to answer my question.  He had gotten his tattoo during his military service and was not a deputy sheriff.  Our sheriff is nothing if not a colorful character and that could be a whole 'nother post.  Anyway, our sheriff has decided that he does not link ink on his deputies.  He has now made it a matter of rejection of future employees.  For those already employed they are required to make sure any visible ink is covered during working hours.  So when he comes straight from work he usually still has is cover on.  Seems like such a very silly requirement.

Also, I know have some great online friends who have ink and they have shown off pictures so that has given me more food for thought.

As you can probably guess by now I don't have any tattoos myself.

But there is a part of me that thinks I might like to have one.  Two things holding me back.  One I don't like pain a whole lot and mostly I know that ink is permanent so I want to make sure that if I go under the needles it needs to be something special and meaningful that I want to spend the rest of my life with.  I probably want it to be something small at least to start with.  One thing that I've considered is something like an ankle bracelet style, but not sure what I would want it to look like.  Finally, I need to find a good place to have it done and since I'm not sure I know anyone locally I'd want to ask this could be the biggest roadblock.

Woman You Admire

Today's journal prompt is:

Write about a woman in your own family whom you admire.


Well I'm nos sure that grandma L is in my "family" or not but we adopted each other so I'm going to count it.  I married her grandson after her own advice not to.  Things ended badly but since continue to be a friend and mentor to me until the day she died.  She was the best great-grandmother to my son and was he caregiver until he was 4 years old and she was in her 80's.  When I started dating my husband I took him over to meet Gram she loved him immediately and even gave me advice on how to treat him right.  She was young when she lost her mother after the birth of her baby sister and the day she turned 14 the legal age at that time her father pulled her out of school to be the caregiver for her family.  She had only a few weeks more of school to graduate from grammar school and he still made her quit.  Despite this she continued to read and learn and was very literate on many subjects.  She married young and had three children right away.  She helped her husband run a diner in Brooklyn and was feisty enough even as a young wife to stand up to anyone.  She saw the lost of everything one day after her husband's gambling had gotten out of control.  And only the discovery of a fourth pregnancy gave her the courage to give him another chance.  He never made the same mistake again and they ended up opening up a diner on Long Island until they retired and moved to Florida.  When her daughter was widow with four young children she helped to raise them as well.  And when she found out everything I had been going through with my ex she said she wished she had known so she could have helped.  After I remarried she supported my husband's decision to adopt my son and even persuaded my ex to sign the paper and allow her grandson to have a safe and stable home.  When I got pregnant she offered to buy us a new crib because she knew my ex had pawned the old one.  We quick went and got one so she wouldn't feel obligated but she still showed up the next week with the crib mattress.  She never showed any difference in her love for my second born then she did for my first born despite the fact that the were not related by "blood".  That never mattered to her in the least.  Family was family and she considered me and mine family.  Her was sad to see her body failing and it wasn't until the very end that her mind also started to slip.  Thankfully, she didn't suffer for too long and her strength of character will always be an inspiration to me.

Once Piece of Advice

So today's journal prompt is:

If you could give one piece of advice only to your children or future generations what would you offer?

Create your own holiday traditions for your own immediate family.  You should not feel obligated to visit with anyone else or spend you holidays anywhere but in your own home.  Now if visiting is what you want to do or inviting others is you bag that's cool.  BUT it is what you decide you want for your family.  You should not have to feel like every holiday is a command visit.  If it's not where you want to be then don't be there.  I promise I won't get mad.  I love spending time with extended family and sometimes its great to share a holiday meal around the table with tons of relatives but there are other times when you yearn for something simpler.  I would just as soon know that I can see you and yours anytime it works for all of us then be obligated by a date on the calendar.  So that's it create your own guilt free holiday traditions for your household.  Love, MOM