A Hundred (and then some) Things About Me

1. I was born on January 1, 1970 by cesarean section at Albert Einstein Medical Center.
2. I am a Capricorn with Scorpio rising.
3. I am the oldest of four siblings – I have two sisters and one brother.
4. My youngest sister is twelve years younger than me.
5. My brother is about four years younger than me.
6. My second youngest sister is eighteen months younger than me.
7. She’s also one of my best friends in the world.
8. We talk on the phone at least twice a day.
9. I've lived away from my parent's home as long as I lived there.
10. After 38 years, my parents recently separated. It sucks about as much as you think it would, no matter how old you are.
11. I am completely, zealously, passionately, crazily in love with my husband.
12. We’ve been together for fourteen years. I’ve known him for seventeen.
13. We were married eleven years to the day he told me he loved me. Almost to the minute.
14. That day, August 6, 2001, was the same day George Bush decided to ignore this.
15. We lived together for ten years before we married.
16. We eloped. Our families knew about it, but weren’t invited to our wedding.
17. We were married in Newfane, Vermont by a Justice of the Peace named Taffy.
18. She was a horsewoman.
19. Neither Georgie or I are particularly fond of horses.
20. We spent our wedding night in Boston at Fenway Park. The Texas Rangers played the BoSox and that night, Scott Hattenberg line drived into a triple play. On his next at bat he hit a grand slam. Probably the first time that’s ever happened.
21. That baseball game is proof that Georgie and I are beshert.
22. I still sleep with my baby blanket. I've had it my entire life. I take it everywhere I go.
23. Georgie washes it with the most tender loving care.
24. My sister and husband know that if I should die, the blanket is to be split in thirds: one to be buried with me, one goes to Georgie and one is to be split between my two sisters.
25. If there was a fire, I have to admit, my blanket would be the first thing I would take with me.
26. I was in a PhD program for Religious Studies when I was 22. My concentration was theological existentialism – specifically the philosophy of Soren Kierkegaard.
27. I think Kierkegaard would be very depressed at the state of religion in the United States right now.
28. I quit the program after a semester.
29. I took up pottery after that.
30. On the first night of my pottery class, I was putting a 25lb. bag of clay into a locker over my head and when I pulled my arms down, I caught my arm on the side of the locker.
31. I needed five stitches.
32. I went back to pottery the next week, with the stitches in my arm.
33. I haven’t thrown a pot in about six years. Sometimes I miss it.
34. The pottery was an antidote to the awful panic/anxiety attacks I was having after I left graduate school.
35. I still get panic/anxiety attacks.
36. I've been in therapy for over ten years because of panic/anxiety attacks.
37. I wouldn’t wish them on my worst enemy.
38. But they’ve taught me a lot about myself.
39. If I were honest with myself, I'd say I don't want them to go away because they are a part of my personality.
40. If I lost the anxiety part of me, I might also lose the passion and obsession part that I love.
41. For instance, I might not be as good a knitter if I wasn’t so crazy.
42. After graduate school I got a job as a research librarian at an investment bank.
43. Eventually I went back to school to get a Masters degree in Library Science.
44. I worked at People Magazine as a librarian for about three months.
45. It was the worst job I ever had.
46. I quit working full time to go back to school to get my Masters degree in Fine Arts in Creative Writing at New York University.
47. My undergraduate degree is also from NYU.
48. I write short stories.
49. I’ve been published four times.
50. I haven’t written a story in longer than I care to admit.
51. It kills me.
52. Everyday I think about it and it upsets me, but I still haven’t written anything.
53. When I was in third grade I wrote an essay about three wishes I had. The first was to be a writer. The second was to meet Shawn Cassidy. I don't remember the third, but one out of three ain't bad.
54. Since I became obsessed with knitting, I don’t read as much as I used to.
55. That’s not true. Since I’ve been trying to get pregnant I haven’t been reading as much as I used to.
56. We can’t get pregnant on our own.
57. This is by far the hardest thing I’ve had to accept.
58. I’m probably one of the only people who can say they went through all of the IVF process (shots, retrieval, etc.) only to back out at the last minute.
59. We panicked and didn’t do the transfer.
60. We have five frozen embryos.
61. I hate that I panicked. I wish this wasn’t so hard for me.
62. I love more than anything that Georgie and I are on the same page.
63. I can tell him anything and know without a doubt that he will love me. Sometimes even more than he did before.
64. No matter how absolutely insane the thing is I tell him.
65. It’s because of him that I am quite passionate about Bruce Springsteen.
66. I fell in love with both of them at the same time.
67. I think Springsteen is one of the greatest love song writers of all time.
68. If you don’t believe me, check out the lyrics to The Fever, Drive All Night, Prove It All Night and a million others.
69. One of my greatest wishes would be to travel back in time and see Springsteen in concert during the Darkness tour.
70. Until time travel is perfected, I’ll have to settle for bootlegs.
71. I’ve seen KISS twice on New Year’s Eve. Once in New Jersey, once in Detroit.
72. I’ve been to the Grammy’s.
73. Bruce was there.
74. I generally have to take a Xanax when I go to a Bruce concert.
75. It’s the closest thing I’ve had to a religious experience.
76. Some people think this makes me crazy.
77. If I were to ever get a tatoo, it would be of Curious George.
78. My best friend Margo moved to Las Vegas a year ago.
79. It about killed me.
80. When her eldest daughter was born, I dreamed about it the night she was in labor. Right down to a clock in my dream that read the time her contractions started.
81. It’s weird, because I’m something of a political person (at the least, I have very strong opinions, but I don’t know how Margo voted in the last election.
82. I voted for Kerry.
83. I’m tired of being angry about the election. I’m trying to be all about the love.
84. I can generally do the Monday-Wednesday New York Times crossword puzzles. They get progressively harder as the week goes on.
85. I volunteered in the Israeli Army when I was 20.
86. My mother went with me.
87. We lived in Be’er Sheva in the Negev Desert on an ammunitions base.
88. My father-in-law is a Greek Orthodox priest.
89. I am Jewish.
90. Everybody loves everybody. Now.
91. I’ve pretty much given up on organized religion. Not that I was very religious to begin with, but I think what I think and dogma won’t change my beliefs.
92. I believe all human beings should have the same unalienable rights, which includes marrying whoever the fuck they want, and doing whatever they want to their body.
93. I was given a digital camera on my 30th birthday and it changed my life.
94. Three years later I opened my own business: CDC Photography LLC.
95. One of my favorite places in the world is La Quinta Resort and Club.
96. We travel there at least once every other year.
97. They sell my greeting cards in their gift shop, which is one of my greatest accomplishments.
98. I had my own photography show at my local library.
99. Three of my photographs (the limit) were selected in the first juried show I ever entered. One of those was chosen Best in Show.
100. If someone told me I would never take another photograph again I would be sad.v
101. If someone told me I would never write another story, I would be devastated.
102. No matter what I decide to take on, Georgie supports me.
103. I’ve pretty much succeeded at everything I’ve tried.
104. This is a fact. It’s because I become completely obsessed with things and don’t stop thinking about them until they’ve been mastered.
105. I’ve pretty much succeeded at everything I’ve tried – except having a baby.
106. I work extremely hard at my marriage. It is absolutely precious to me.
107. My nephew and niece (and baby to come) are beyond important in my life.
108. I love them more than is imaginable. If I never have children of my own it will be okay, because I have them.
109. My mother’s mother, my Grandmother, taught me to knit one rainy afternoon. She gave me day-glo orange Red Heart wool and plastic needles.
110. She can’t believe how far I’ve come from that afternoon.
111. She taught many of her grandchildren, but I’m the only one who stuck with it.
112. My father’s mother, my Nana, was a wonderful knitter.
I’m glad to keep it in the family.