"Tagged! "--10 Things About Me You Might Not Know

Fred has given out ten things about himself to further illuminate his sterling personality and all that stuff.  Now it's my turn to give out with personal details you didn't know (or cared) to find out.

 

10. From the picture above, you can see that as a lad I once took a burro ride at my parents' urging while on a camping trip to Yosemite National Park, Circa 1966. I was looking out at  the world from the wrong  end of a donkey. From such humble beginnings...seriously, I had a lot of fun in those  days. Northern California was a great place to grow up.

9. Although I've lived in Oregon for the last 19 years and lived in Florida as a high-school kid, I consider myself a Californian.  I grew up in  San Jose, California--before it became the overpriced and all-too-crowded "Silicon Valley".    It was a reasonably safe neighborhood. My friends and I ran and biked and ran all over the neighborhood--there was less danger for kids, or there were so many of us 'baby boomer" kids back then, perhaps we were just more expendable. 

I lived across the street from my elementary school and I got to play a lot of pick-up baseball, basketball and football games   (I was an only child,so I made a lot of friends because I had enough time to myself at home. )  We usually didn't have to come in until dark in the Summer time, which was around eight or nine o'clock.

8.   As a young 12-13 year old , I would sometimes sneak out of my parents house late at night, meet up with a few friends and we would go "T-P-ing" houses.  (Covering the trees in front of people's houses with toilet paper.) I was lucky we never got caught.  I'm not proud of this mischief, but I don't want you to think I was one of those "nice little boys" who tattle-tale out their friends for having fun to the school principal or something. ( I was a bit of a budding delinquent.) 

7. I played in football and baseball sports leagues for kids growing up,  but it only baseball where I had reasonable success.  I played baseball in high school for awhile and was a decent left-hand hitter. I also played in a couple softball teams when I grew up.  I've been a lifelong baseball fan and student of its history. 

6. I came back to California and the Bay Area with my parents in 1978.  At 22, I graduated from Cal-State Hayward with a BA degree in Political Science.  I started off getting into teacher training, but my heart wasn't in it.  I'm an introvert and being in front of people for a long time gave me panic attacks.   The only thing I regret was not studying harder so I could have got into a post-grad slot at UC-Berkeley.  I don't think I'd have done more with my life, but Berkeley or Stanford would have been a great atmosphere for learning.           

5.  As religion goes, I was an atheist and an agnostic most of my early years. I only began to believe in God at 32 and became a practicing Christian a couple years afterward.  I belong to the Presbyterian Church in my town. In fact I got very little religious education as a youth--my father was very skeptical of  organized religion and my mother a lapsed Methodist. This actually paid off for me because I became a believer as an adult with both eyes open so to speak.

4.  I've read books all my life--"Lord Jim" by Joseph Conrad is my favorite novel--but to tell you the truth movies are my favorite entertainment activity.  The day I got to go to a grown-up movie all by myself around age 11 was one of the happiest days in my life. I love all kinds of films and was lucky to grow up with friends who shared this passion--one of whom became a film editor. I made Super 8 movies in high school with friends--nothing fancy, but with car chases and action-adventure themes--and to this day I look back on that part of my life with great pleasure.

3. I've been married twice.  (Had my first real date at 17. Seems like I was a bit of a late-starter, but now I look back and realize I had a lot of time and no reason to be anxious.) I take responsibility for 60 percent of my first marriage going wrong.  I have no children, but I have two great kids who call me "Grandpa Doug".   Such is the wonder of blended families. 

2. I like blogging because it gives me a chance to talk to people all over the English-speaking world and it saves on travel expenses and me having to walk up to people I've never met and say, "Is that so?  Well here's what I think."  Introverts don't just jump up and greet people.  This is a good way for me to communicate.  

1. My wife and I watch the daytime soap opera "The Young and the Restless" every weekday night after dinner, unless we have guests or are out of town.  I get a kick out of the plot twists it and barely plausible machinations of all the desperate characters.   (There, I saved the most shocking revelation for last.)