The life you could have lived

My name is Tam, and I’m a Facebook addict. I willingly admit this and endure all of the repercussions (my husband’s constant teasing). This weekend during a stellar Facebook stalking session… I saw a picture of THE EX. He’s not on Facebook (trust me I’ve checked) but as I was clicking through some pictures of a wedding. BOOM. A stupid picture of HIS FACE and his WIFE/GIRLFRIEND (there was a glass covering up his left hand so I couldn’t see a ring). There he was hanging out with the same cohort of jocks and ditsy girls that I chugged Natural Light and Boons Farm with in high school – only now they’re weathered and frumpy and have half a dozen snot-nosed kids at home. Next to him sat a guy I knew since the third grade, who dreamed of going to Duke and becoming a doctor, but married his high school sweet heart at 19 and attended community college instead.

Flashback: THE EX was the most popular guy in school – football running back with tanned skin, muscles ga-lore and touted as the most decorated wrestler in the state. I was the cheerleader, honor society, lead in the school play, red head who rarely mentioned her AP classes and secretly applied to pre-med programs. He got a full ride to state university and I went away to a liberal arts (“aggie”) college on a vocal music scholarship. He cheated on me with a college cheerleader and stopped returning my phone calls. I was devastated, and begged, and offered to do all of his term papers, but nothing worked. This was not a shining moment for me. For the next four years, I swore off men relationships, secretly waiting for him to realize his colossal mistake and come crawling back to me.

Getting dumped flat on my ass by that boy was one of the best things that has ever happened in my entire life.

Looking at that untagged Facebook photo, his face was rounder and his black hair was thinning. His eyes looked beady and bored. His lady was a completely AVERAGE looking blond, a little on the homely side probably drinking water so she could drive them home. There he sat at a table of his high school cronies, who sell either insurance or beer for a living. Not a bad job, but they don’t have school loans, political insight or stories of world travels. I’d venture to guess none of them volunteer or donate to charity. Am I a snob? Probably. Am I stuck living in the SAME town, with the SAME friends, shagging the SAME two pump chump I met in the tenth grade? No. But I could have been.

[From Smitten]…basically, if I were going to name the application, I'd call it the…narcissism app. In eras past, when WOmen have lain in bed wondering what alternate lives they may have had, they were relegated to imagining those BOYfriends of yore, conjuring images of them in their heads, looking all lithe and tan and pretty and whatnot. Only now you just have to type in HIS name and suddenly you can see pictures of her with a terrifying-looking three year-old and her very unfortunate bob haircut HIM with gelled hair and a stodgy girlfriend probably still reminiscing about high school rushing yard records.

My husband went to Duke and is becoming a doctor. I never dreamed of him. I own a house, have traveled abroad and work as a respected researcher in a field that I love. I never dreamed of that either. I actually used to dream of the life those people are living.

I got more than I dreamed of.

Thank you Facebook, for reminding me.

My Favorite Things - 80's Edition

Yesterday had me all nastalgic and stuff so I thought today I'd present a special edition:

My favorite things 1988-1992

layered neon slouch Socks

Slap bracelets

Lee Press On Nails

Banana clips

Skip it

high bangs

Penny hockey

Trapper Keepers

tight rolled stonewash jeans

Pogo Ball

Scratch and Sniff stickers

Troll dolls

chapstick in metal tins

my new breast buds

(and oh god did I ever love my cassett tapes!!)

Tiffany (Tiffany) - I wanted to be her *so* bad

Debbie Gibson (Out of the Blue)

Ace of Base (The Sign)

NKOTB (Step By Step/ Hangin' Tough)

Also, I found this site and laughed OUT LOUD at the obsurd names of my toys. I also felt incredibly spoiled because I had every one of these toys (except the Teddy Ruxpin because my mom said it was a piece of shit and would probably break before I got it home.)
Popples?
Wuzzles?
Pound Puppy?
Smooshies?
Fluppy dog?
My Child doll? (her felt face always got so dirty!)
Also that Roller Racer thing smashed the crap out of your fingers if you weren't careful. Ouch!

My boss was recently telling me that her teenage daughter is begging for a Ouiji board and she can't find one anywhere. Her daughter asked what it was like to play with one and if she ever played, "light as a feather, stiff as a board." Um, I DID!!

Silver Spoons and Webster were good too, but not as good as these

Sometimes I think back to the shows that I used to watch when I was little. I was recently reading Fergie's Wikipedia page because I wanted to find out more about her struggle with methamphetamine. No luck on the meth details, but it did say she got her start on Kids Incorporated. [warm gushy memories flooding back] I loved that show.

Kids Incorporated


Star Search
Every week I would brainstorm the song that I would sing, when I was picked for the show.


Punky Brewster
In kindergarten, I had glow-in-the-dark Punky shoes, all the cool kids wanted to lay by me at nap time to see them glow. I wish I still had them. Punky was my hero and this is the episode where I decided I would never take drugs. Thinking back, the girls in the clip look nothing like drug users. Nothing.


By second grade, I was totally boy crazy and obsessed with The Monkees. My friend had a Monkee's themed birthday party and I remember dancing around in her finished basement to her new tape seething with jealousy. I contemplated punching her in the face and making off with the tape. I wasn't a very good friend.


Glamour and glitter, fashion and fame... JEM! Truly Truly Truly Outrageous! I watched this every day after school while eating a piece of bread topped with one melty kraft single and a dill pickle. Every.Day.


and on the big screen...

The Hugga Bunch Movie
Don't ask. (But I wish I owned this movie.)


Flowers in the Attic
I watched this at a sleepover. I had to have my mom pick me up early (per usual, I never spent the night places) and wouldn't eat powdered sugar for two years. I actually bought this movie a few years ago, just to remind myself not to poison my kids if I ever have any.


**I decided I want some of these shows on DVD so my kids can watch them too. I found the complete box set of Punky Brewster and Fraggle Rock on Amazon... MEGA EXPENSIVE! I also found some Strawberry Shortcake DVDs. My kid (that remains only a figment of my imagination) is going to be totally up on 80's TV and not those gay Wiggles/Tellitubbies.

I want this.

Having a classy stand like this makes the TV look less like a monstrous blinky chalkboard and more like a piece of art (especially if you add the baskets, stones and crap). I clicked my heels together and asked for it but I'm not sure if the wishing fairy shops at Pottery Barn and I don't want a cheap replica that she picks up at Odd Lots for a quarter of the price.



Not to worry though, I got a note under my pillow that said this:

Dear Tam,

If you want to trade me your husband's 50" DLP flat screen for the stand I will be more than happy to grant your wish. Your call.

Best,
Wish Fairy

Guess I'll have to keep on wishing...

your hormones are raging so just pick a major

I find it appalling that American youth are asked to make critical decisions about their future at a time when breast size and Friday night football take top priority. Most haven't served a burger let alone their country and the idea of reading something with actual chapters is nauseating.

When I was eighteen and enjoying the repercussions of a generous chest I was faced with the question: What will you be when you grow up? I had been walking dogs free of charge at a veterinary clinic for years, so it was only natural that I wanted to be… a veterinarian. In college, I remember looking down on my classmates in general education classes affixed with the “undecided” scarlet letter and thinking how they really should pick a direction or they’d end up eating “special” brownies after their shift at Ponderosa for the rest of their lives.

I sit here as a qualitative illicit drug researcher (think non-veterinarian) wondering how, with the exception of the breasts, not one shred of those poop-scooping teenage dreams are with me today. Maybe the kids on the hallucinogenic baked goods had one up on me. I spent the beginning of election season pondering how someone could label themselves an independent and by the end, and not a single robo-call, I wanted shed my democratic labels. Our political process has taught me that ANYONE can be a vice presidential candidate and, moreover, you get more attention if you make your mind up late in the game.

I’ve been thinking a lot about this lately as I study once again for the dreaded GRE (math called, it hates me). I want to go back to earn a terminal degree and although I know it will be in the field of public health (my Masters wants a sister), I still have no idea what I will be when I grow up. I aspire to be the Surgeon General but since I will leave the MD degree to my husband I may need to settle for something else.

For the last two days I’ve thought about all of the things I want to do, career or otherwise: birth a child and raise it to be a contributing member of our society, travel to Norway and Ireland, wear something fashionable and actually pull it off, celebrate a 50th wedding anniversary with my sweet husband, learn to knit, go to the Ellen show, and take a photography class. I want to take a photography class. And then I thought – why wasn’t I a photographer? Why wasn’t I a singer? Why am I not in marketing? Why am I not a freelance writer for a chick magazine? Maybe all of those undecideds have taken those jobs. Maybe while I was palpating cows with my one-track mind, other people were exploring various interests and joys only to spin a bottle and land in one exciting direction or another. Maybe they are living in a posh flat sorting through stacks of book reviews and photography journals awaiting their next flight to a Swaziland relief mission. The realist in me knows that with an obsessive desire to plan my every step an ambiguous future has never suited me, but I want to be open to paths with which my heart and skills can take me. I am fun, imaginative, creative, passionate, smart, level-headed, organized and my piece will fit into so many puzzles. One day I will take a photography class. And maybe eat those brownies too.