posted
Was this before or after Elizabeth's Chicken thread? Well, anyway, it's kind of a good thought. My little niece has Down's Syndrome and we think she's great. She got me hooked on Roly Poly Oly's "Totally Chocolate Dinner".
Posts: 2010 | Registered: Apr 2003
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posted
I didn't see you resurrect this one, Squick. Thanks for the reminder. I had nearly forgotten about it.
A few months after this incident I took a walk down a nearby street and saw the same guy sitting with his guitar, playing and singing for a crowd that wasn't there. I threw a couple of dollars into his hat as a token of my appreciation for his enthusiasm and talent. His guitar was just for decoration, but I thought it looked nice on him.
And while I don't envy him his disability, I still hold him as an example. I can't see him ever apologizing to anyone for who he is, nor ever needing to. I've stopped apologizing for who I am, now my goal is being the kind of person who never needs to.
Squick - I am much, much closer to gettin' me some chicken. Thank you for asking. I'm astonished by how much I've learned about myself and the world in general in the last two years. I've made more crap decisions in the last twenty-five months than I had in the previous twenty-five years, and sweet jiminy. It's amazing how fixing and repairing consequences to your actions produce some awfully quick learnin'. I wonder how long it would have otherwise taken me to get this clear a grasp on who I am, clearer than I've ever had before. I guess just some of us have to be stupid to be smart.
Now, I wouldn't presume to say I'm possession of a bucket of the Colonel's original recipe. But I'm certainly inching ever closer to the drive-up menu.
posted
Thanks, Mr.Squicky--this was a great resurrecto-thread. I remember it originally, even though I never posted on it. I like the depth of emotion that everyone posted, that touches on their core identity. That's rare, in any setting. I especially liked Jexx's first post.
Life is a constant struggle between your identity and where you fit into the social hierarchy--the chicken guy just highlights it. The trick (which I haven't mastered) is to balance the two, somehow. Morbo
Dan and I were meeting at a small Thai food restaurant to grab some dinner after work, and I spotted the gentleman from my original post walking toward us!
After recovering from the coincidence, I stopped and waved and said "Hi!" and he waved back. He had headphones on, so we weren't able to perform a formal introduction, but the very fact that I posted mere days ago that I feel closer to gettin' me some chicken than ever before and actually SPOTTING the guy that spawned this entire episode to begin with was almost uncanny.
I wanted to go get chicken with him. I have an odd sense of oneness with the universe right now. It's not that I feel the same sense of unself-consciousness I desired a year and a half ago when I first spotted my guy. But I have made the decision to never apologize for who I am. Inappropriate actions, pain I've caused others... of course. But never for who I am.
Maybe the torch has been officially been passed. Perhaps I, too, now have me some chicken. In fact, I know I do.
quote: But I have made the decision to never apologize for who I am. Inappropriate actions, pain I've caused others... of course. But never for who I am.
Words to live by. Morbo
Posts: 327 | Registered: Oct 2003
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posted
Ralphie wrote: "This bothers me a great deal. Sometimes I believe it is the ones with most disadvantages that truly appreciate what they have."
This reminds me of an episode of the Sopranos where Tony is talking to the Russian nurse. She has only one leg, and he is so amazed that she is not an alcoholic. Her rsponse went something like this:
You Americans are such babies. You expect to be happy, and you are always disappointed when something goes wrong. The rest of the world expects to be unhapppy, and they are never disappointed. She went on to talk about how we analyze ourselves, etc, when everyone else is too busy to think so much about themselves.
Posts: 10890 | Registered: May 2003
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posted
What I find interesting, Toni, is your evolution toward an unashamed acceptance of yourself (and how great that is). But also the fact that it is occurring in your late 20's. I, too, have gone through this, and am now at the point where I am happy with the person I am. I know I have things to work on, but, to a certain extent, I "own" myself and am not embarressed by what I like and who I am.
Much of it, as you probably know, if due to the painful divorce I went through this past year. But I think part of it is also the fact that after 10 or 12 years of living as an "adult" and getting into (and out of) all the messes that you do trying to figure yourself out, you finally arrive at peaceful acceptance and a good perspective. I'm 30 years old (soon to be 31) and like myself and am, to a certain extent, largely satisfied with my life and the decisions I've made. There are things that I wish I had done differently. And certainly there are things I wish had never happened. But I've had a good life and am ready for more.
It's a great feeling. And interestingly enough, a friend of mine told me, many years ago, that right after he turned 30, things just seemed to fall into place. He became secure in who he was. It is nice to arrive at this place.
Though I'll not be belting out tunes on an unplugged mike, thank you very much. That's just not me.
posted
Used to be, my default answer to "What are you doing?" was "Is this a trick question?".
Because normally, when the question is presented, what I'm doing is both fairly obvious and mostly odd.
So last weekend I went to the beach with a friend, and as she laid down for a nap and a tan, I went down towards the water to make a sand castle amidst all the crazy spring-breakers. As I was putting up about the third wall/moat combo to combat the advancing tide, she came up behind me and asked what I was doing.
"Gettin' myself some chicken."
Thanks, Ralphie, for giving my friends another reason to think I'm missing screws.
Posts: 270 | Registered: Jul 2004
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Today when we went to Cingular to pay my dad's phone bill, we noticed a middle-aged black woman wearing a purple jogging suit dancing in some grass between rows in the parking lot. She was just standing there grooving to her own beat.
I waited in the car while Dad went inside. I watched her and heard her say "money" and "Carter" and "peanuts", but couldn't figure out what she talking about.
I asked Dad when he returned what was up with her, and he said,"She wants to put Carter on the money." We watched her dance and listened to her as we pulled out. "President Carter! On the money! The peanut man!" she would say, in a singsong chant.
As Ben says, that is all. [edit:btw, this is a true story. I'm not mocking Toni or anyone else.]
posted
I'm so glad you bumped this. I'd forgotten about it. I think I still want to be Ralphie when I grow up.
Posts: 5948 | Registered: Jun 2001
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I'm prone to getting up on a table at a party and leading the crowd in a round of song-- and everyone knows I don't drink. I throw costume parties at the least provocation-- like New Year's-- or none at all-- just so I can wear the most outrageous one of the bunch. I get together with girlfriends I've known since Brownies and laugh so hard I start snorting-- actually I'm not always the one who starts it-- in public. I laugh and gasp and squeal out loud at books in public libraries. I cry openly at movies. Like, you know, Finding Nemo. I walk my cats on leashes. I sing and dance to amuse the Princess in almost any situation, regardless of decorum. I eat messy food with my fingers and unapologetically get it all over my face. I'm prone to walk down the street singing whatever song's stuck in my head.
Yeah, I likes me some chicken.
Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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posted
Interesting observations, everyone. Ralphie, I love that observant eye, that led you to share here in the first place. That is an attribute of you, which I hope you wouldn't give up in pursuit of simple pleasures.
I identify here, but like I others I honestly wouldn't want to be 'that guy.' But why? This quickly becomes a sticky debate in my own head. Which trappings -- which trees in the forest -- am I so attached to, and why?
I go through this exercise when I am working on my household budget. How many phones, internet accounts, cars, toys, cable services, gadgets, etc., do I really need? Okay... none. But god it's hard to let go sometimes.
As for inhibitions and letting out the 'real you': I've slowly come to realize that when people first meet me they consider me a little forbidding, and certainly serious, probably 'dignified,' and possibly boring. Unaccessible.
But I am proud that the people closest to me know otherwise: I am goofy, and punny, and unpredictable, and irreverent, and don't generally take myself too seriously. But I don't feel any imperative to show all those sides of myself to everyone all the time.
Posts: 431 | Registered: Oct 2003
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posted
I accidently clicked as soon as Hatrack loaded without barely even seeing the page and boom! I landed up here. Now thats what you call ironic.
Posts: 2827 | Registered: Jul 2005
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I'm really too tired to work it out coherently, but suffice it to say I've been going through some rough times in my head this past week. But today I watched a man ride a bike, holding a box of chicken, and it made me think of this thread. And, as it did 6 months ago, it's encouraged me. Encouraged me to go get me some chicken. This is a tough concept for me to wrap my head around for some reason, but for today it has served its purpose to lift me up before I slid too far.
posted
It's weird. I remember that conversation. (If Ralphie reads this some time, I'll put in, I remember all our conversations.) Ralphie captured it so well with the image.
I've been considering going out and getting some action figures and playing with them like I used to when I was a kid. I remember hours and hours of fun imagining whole worlds with only a few He-Man and G.I. Joe action figures.
I may have to go get some now. My roommates are going to be surprised to see me crawling around the floor when they come home Posts: 3950 | Registered: Mar 2006
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