Friday, July 10, 2009

This is me

Sometimes it feels as if the individuals we encounter during our blog explorations have joined our circle of friends. Certainly there are several blogs that I read regularly and I hold their authors in high esteem and some days it feels as if I truly know them and they know me.

Today while reading blogs it occurred to me that most of you who read my blog really don't know me. If you judge who I am and what I'm interested in based solely on what you've read in my blog then you only know a very small bit about who I am.

Most of you probably don't really care about the bits I don't write. We really have a very superficial relationship. It's alright. I'm ok with that.

It should be apparent that first and foremost I'm a wife and mother. Whenever I have to fill out a form that asks for occupation I write "mom." This blog also reflects that I have an interest in cooking, sewing, and crafting. I think that most of what I blog about concerns one or more of the subjects I've listed so far.

The things I don't write about (at least not more than once a year) are politics (I'm ultra conservative- but if you've been reading for a while you know that), health (I have an autoimmune inflammatory arthritis), my dreams and ambitions (mostly on hold until I have time to list something other than "mom" under occupation), my childhood (I grew up on a small farm and my mother and grandfather both worked in academia. My father died when I was 22 months old), and my marriage (because marriage is private and I don't ever want my husband to wonder what I'm telling the world about him).

Rarely, if ever, do I write about the things I really dislike. I don't tell you (until today) that I hate stupid people. Oops, I've been trying to get my kids to quit using words like hate and stupid. What I really meant to say is: I have a strong dislike of dealing with people who are intellectually challenged. There are a lot of intellectually challenged people in the world. A lot of those people seem to have life paths that intersect mine on a regular basis.

I don't write about how much I really, really, really like science and math. My best friend thinks I'm weird because one of the things that draws me to quilt is that it satisfies the math part of my brain with it's planning, continuity, and rhythm. She's asked me to refer beginning quilting questions to her instead of scaring people by telling them how much quilting is like math :-) Science is life. Math is life. Everything in the universe when broken into it's component parts is math and science. I accidentally minored in chemistry during college (and purposely minored in biology, ecology, economics, and zoology). Discussing disease vectoring actually excites me. Just a warning... I enjoy discussing nutrition and one of my dreams is pursuing cancer research (there's this theory I have...).

When people meet me these days I am sure that what they see is an overweight, thirty-something, homeschooling, mother of three. I'm sure that it's not a suprise to anyone that I bake bread and make yogurt. It's not suprising that I can sew or even that I'm a 4-H leader. What might suprise you is that I think being conservative means making fewer rules and allowing other people to make their own choices. It might suprise people that not only can I sort out lambs during a difficult delivery, I can kill an animal if it's needed.

Today I usually wear jeans, knit shirts, and Birkenstocks. I grew up wearing jeans, knit shirts, and cowboy boots. My boots were fashionable (for boots) but they all had traces of manure on the soles and the heels were designed to keep my foot from slipping through the stirrup in the event my horse "got in a storm" (which means an animal moving quickly and not rationally placing it's body to avoid injuring itself or it's rider). My neck curves the wrong way coming out of my head because more than once in my life I've been thrown from a horse and landed uncomfortably. Every injury I ever aquired (except for skinned knees from the bike) was aquired while dealing with livestock.

When I was in high school I was very active in 4-H and FFA. As a freshman my horse judging team placed first at State FFA Contests and we went to Nationals. When I graduated from high school there were universities interested in me simply because of my competitive judging skills. I raised Suffolk sheep and showed Arabian horses (because that one Quarter Horse we had tried to kill me). During the course of my 4-H career I won almost every event I participated in at one time or another (not there weren't people who consistently beat me). Round Robin (where top showman from each species compete to be THE top showman. Large animal round robin is sheep, horses, beef cattle, dairy cattle, pigs, goats, and sometimes llamas. Small animal round robin is rabbits, cavies, poultry, pygmy goats, cats, and dogs) was my favorite event- except that I never did get the hang of either showing or judging swine. I was a District FFA officer, attained the State FFA Degree, and always placed 2nd in the parliamentarian contest at State FFA Convention.

The reason I don't write these things on the blog is because (having just looked over my post) it doesn't sound good. There are way to many "I"s. It's not polite. It looks remarkably like boasting :-) Tonight I don't care. I'm tired of listening to people talk about things they don't know anything about. I'm tired of having people assume that because I'm a stay at home mom I know nothing of the rest of the world. I really resent it when people assume that because my life moves at the pace of a three year old I only know what a three year old knows. It really bothers me when men make the assumption that I must not have an intelligent opinion because I'm a wife and mother (and don't have a penis- thank God). In general I am really amused by people who keep saying, "I'm intelligent," If you're intelligent you shouldn't have to tell people- they should be able to figure it out without you labeling yourself for them.

What I'd really like you all to know is that I am more than a wife and mother. My world does not begin and end with potty training and bread baking. There is more going on in my head than laundry detergent recipes and methods of teaching reading. Please don't underestimate my intelligence or ability to assimilate and analyze data. In return I will try to remember that all of you most likely do not blog about everything going on in your heads either. We all have areas of our life we choose to share with the world. That doesn't mean that our worlds hold only the things we write about.

6 comments:

Marbel said...

I enjoyed getting to know you through this post.

jugglingpaynes said...

I always think it's better to greet each person as an equal. I've found you can learn something interesting from everyone, if you are willing to accept that you won't always agree on every issue. (For example, I could never kill an animal. I respect that you can do it, and I do eat meat, but I used to give flies and roaches second chances when I was a child! If they get up after I whack 'em, they can live.) :o)

Thank you for your comment! I've found that it is possible to unschool even if I'm following Classical guidelines. It's all in how you let your kids follow the topics that excite them!

Peace and Laughter,
Cristina

Amy said...

You forgot to mention that you are also a loyal friend and a caring person.

Oh and my Mom may have taken a couple steps closer to yours with the kitchen remodel!

Susan said...

Thanks for sharing that.
I'm with you on the science thing...science is definitely LIFE. Our kids learned their science outside, or with various 4-H projects...always hands on.
Your 4-H family sounds so much like our 4-H family. It's in the blood.

Christine said...

What else ..... you hate clicky people aside from those intellectually challenged. I think I knew everything you wrote about you save the cancer research thingy. Intrigued do post more.... is there a consperiacy theory involved?

Blind Dog Megan said...

Thanks for sharing all of this. I do think that your intelligence and kindness has come through in past blogs, but it is cool to know more details about your interests and backgrounds.

I tend to hold a lot back in my blog too because I know it is a public forum and want to keep certain things private.

Thanks again for sharing :)

Jake camping in the living room

Jake camping in the living room