What Can I Say About Me?

So....I'm taking this web design course this semester and for the term's work, the instructor wants us to build a personal website. Okay, fine and dandy but the first assignment is to write something about yourself. She wants us to build this site on real, live, genuine content. I hate writing these profiles and bios that all these kinds of sites demand but I went for it this time. We had free rein according to the assignment brief, so I spilled my guts. Okay....I bled a little. Here's what I wrote....

A Little Personal Truth…

Well, for starters, I live in a former Danish whorehouse……and my dog had the temerity to up and die on Christmas Eve. I miss him a lot; the “clients” knocking on my door at all hours, not so much. Maybe, I should knock on wood to help make sure there won’t be a customer later on this afternoon. It really doesn’t do much for one’s self esteem to be providing that much disappointment on a regular basis.

You might wonder how I got into this situation in the first place. I’m not a retired madam seeking a career change or anything like that. I’m just an expatriate wife who happened to lease the house, a couple of years ago, when the need for suitable accommodation near Copenhagen presented itself…along with a job opportunity. I was looking for 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, and a nice expanse of counter space (for cooking). As a bonus I got more than I bargained for…and I don’t exactly mean the in-ground pool. I got a nice introduction to the neighborhood my first morning there, and one of my “neighbors” got the shock of his life when it was me who answered the door….and not who he was expecting!

My take on life skewed a little that day…..well, on my life, anyway. I came to believe that all things are possible. Any inkling of “that would never happen to me” vanished the first time I opened the door to a man who was expecting a “very nice lady from Bangkok” and got “flannel-clad matron from Canada” instead. I am now open to the possibility that….you name it….it could happen. In a couple of months, we are moving to Abu Dhabi. I am certain a wayward poppy seed, from a bagel eaten in 2006, is caught in the weave of a sweater I haven’t worn in ages. It will get me 4 years in a desert slammer. I just know it…

Kind of a pity, really, since for most of the rest of my life, I’ve been pretty good at keeping out of trouble…a couple of speeding tickets, and a little white lie here and there. Which brings me to….

The Biggest Lie I Ever Told…

In the city that I grew up in, a child had to be 5 years old by the 30th day of September in order to start school. My birthday is in November, so there would be no kindergarten for me, in the year of our Lord one thousand nine hundred and fifty-nine. (I’m writing that out longhand so the full impact of just how long ago that is might get lost to those of you who are just skimming.) However, my mother decided that I was more than ready to start, and to give her mother (my babysitter) a break; she enrolled me in a private Catholic school close to her office. I loved it!! Being 4 years old was no handicap there, and sometimes I got to ride in the back of Mrs. McGregor-Stewart’s old Rolls Royce…..but I can’t remember why or where we would go in it. Who knows, maybe I just climbed in, uninvited, and made a general nuisance of myself.

Mom and I were bus people in those days. Not thinking green, just lacking it….which meant that after a very successful year with the nuns at The Convent of the Sacred Heart, I was told I would not be returning to my beloved school for first grade. I wouldn’t even be going to a Catholic school because the Protestant one was closer, and more convenient. In hindsight, I wondered if there might not have been a scholarship available for a down-and-out kid who could really benefit from the network of contacts an exclusive private school would offer. I would have been one of those great alumni who give back when they make it big….and at the very least, I’d probably still be a Catholic today.

So, as it happened, due to our inability to come up with the $120 required for my tuition, I was relegated to the public school system. My first day was a nightmare for me, and for my teacher, but that is a whole other story I have to save for later. Let’s just say there were some misunderstandings and adjustment issues. The important part of this story is that I was the youngest kid in my class. Everyone was already six years old or very close to it. I was new, and I was five, and being honest about my age had just earned me the title of “baby” in the class. It didn’t seem to matter that I was one hundred times better at coloring in the lines than all the rest of those kids. I got little respect….and even less when I tried to show off my times tables. Those six year olds didn't even know what they were!

Now, I’ve always been a firm believer in the idea that you can be anyone, or anything, that you want yourself to be. By the end of September 1960, I wanted to be six…so, so badly…and a birthday party would make me six…officially…..and very publicly. I would no longer be the only five year old in Miss Ferguson’s grade one clsss. I began to deliver word of mouth invitations to my new pals. It was such a long time ago that I can’t really remember the entire arc to my fable, but I do know that when pressed for details, I provided them…..along with my address. In my head, I wasn’t really fibbing because at some point I was going to try and finagle a party out of my mother. Was it really important what order I worked out the finer details?

Everything was hunky-dory, and I was the center of some positive attention for a change since mine was to be the first birthday party of the new school year. Yeah, it felt great for a while. Then, as it got closer, I admitted to myself that just because I said there was going to be a party……didn’t meant that I was going to be able to convince my mother to actually have one. The idea of approaching my mother with an “It’s too late to do anything about it now, they’re coming!” plan seemed downright idiotic. I knew she’d never go for it.

To further add to my squeamishness, the kids I’d invited started to tantalize me about what great presents they had bought. I felt the full weight of guilt as only one who has spent a year with the sisters at The Convent of the Sacred Heart can feel. There was no option but to bail and cancel the whole thing….which I did. I told each and every person that, unfortunately, the whole thing was off for a reason I can no longer remember. I have a vague recollection of some disgruntled no-longer-invitee suggesting it had all been a hoax, but fully relieved, and having wiggled my way out of the trap….I relaxed. Whew!

I’m not sure exactly how much time passed between then and the lovely Saturday afternoon that my Mom, sister, and I took a walk over to the drug store at the Bayer’s Road Shopping Center to buy some ice cream. My guess it was one or two weeks. I do remember what a perfectly gorgeous sunny day it was. I’ll never forget the cute little girl, all dressed up, with a present on her lap, sitting in a living room chair…..waiting. And most likely wondering….what kind of twilight zone she had stepped into with her pretty little patent leather shoes. My grandmother had let her in….

I remember coming in the front door, eating a Fudgsicle. I remember my grandmother telling my mother that this girl had come to the house for my “birthday party”. I remember scrambling to come up with a split second solution on the fly. I dripped chocolate from the Fudgsicle onto the toe of white sneakers. I remember trying to be cheerful and suggesting that we could have a party anyway….we had more Fudgsicles and ice cream, didn’t we!? I really tried to put a positive face on the whole sordid affair. I knew I was doomed but maybe, just maybe, a little fast talking could get me out of it.

Unfortunately, Mom wasn’t in the mood for fast talking. I really wasn’t either but guess I figured as long as my mouth was moving and I was busy grasping at straws, I wouldn’t die of mortification. I think this was the one time in my childhood that I was more terrified by what I had done, than of the wrath of my mother. She says to this day that she has never been so embarrassed in her life. I believe her. After 50 years, I can still feel that gut dropping feeling like it was yesterday even though I can’t remember that girl’s name. I can still feel the heat in my face that I felt in my cheeks when my mother (with me in tow) took the little girl home, and made me face her mother with the truth. At this point the memories fade…but Mom says that woman was mightily pissed. No kidding!

What’s kind of funny is that I don’t remember too much more of first grade. I can remember lots of things from second grade, but I’m supposing my return to class on the Monday following this little escapade was a little too traumatic for a six year old wannabe. I do remember that I could never remember much about that year at all. Must have been a rough day, that first day back…..

Have I ever lied about my age since then? Well, truth be told, I have.