First of all, to my mom: Happy Mother's Day! Thank you for giving me birth, for keeping me happy and alive through childhood, for supporting my endeavours and my choices in life and for being fucking hilarious. I hope you enjoy the trip to the spa we're setting up for you! I'm not saying which spa here, because I don't want you to be harassed by blog-reading riff-raff. Riff-raff - you know who you are.
Second of all, to hopeful mothers-to-be Whozat & Shrike: I WILL get to those memes. I PROMISE.
Third of all, to wenders' mom: You questions are answered below. Also, Happy Mother's Day!!
A little background - wenders was playing this interview game on her blog and ended up interviewing her mom, KnittingPainterWoman. I joked on PainterWoman's blog that I thought wenders' questions for her were quite restrained and that if I had been interviewing MY mother, I probably would have asked a bunch of accusatory questions like "why did you ground me so much?" PainterWoman, like my mother, is a therapist - perhaps she sensed that I needed "talk a few things out". So she sent me the following awesome questions:
What question would you most like your mother to answer, and what do you think that answer would be?
The truth is that I don't remember ever actually being grounded. It wasn't that I didn't get in trouble, mind you, but a stern talking-to, followed by extra chores or perhaps docking of allowance were generally the punishments of choice. In fact, I was quite proud that, unlike most of my friends, I never got grounded. I asked my mom once why she was against it. If I recall correctly, she said something like: "Well, sweetie, if you've done something that made me so angry that I wanted to ground you, the last thing I'd want is you hanging around here all day and reminding me that I'm pissed off." Which I think makes all kinds of sense.
As for what question I would CURRENTLY like my mother to answer, that's a tough one. I COULD ask her something like "How'd you get to be so cool?" or "Would you rather a wrist corsage or a pin-on deal for our big gay wedding?" But the reality is that I'm not a person who asks a lot of questions. I prefer to make things up. Also, I've been watching alot of Alias lately, so I suppose that my fantasy question for my mom would be "All those years that you were an elementary school librarian, bringing home the most awesome books ever and patiently, lovingly teaching us to read . . . were you also, by any chance, secretly a space cowgirl, fighting for interstellar justice, backed by an anonymous billionaire?" And I imagine her answer would be: "That's right. Between working full time and having two kids three years apart, I was also saving the universe, darling. One space-hog at a time." And then I would say "I KNEW it!!" and then she would show me her space boots.
If you got to pick an "alternate life" how would it be the same/different from the one you have now?
I'm kind of a lazy dilettante. I've dabbled in many artistic and athletic pursuits in my life, but whenever anything started to require actual work (like reading a manual or learning music theory or drinking fewer milkshakes before dance class), I would lose interest. This is an ongoing problem for me, actually, and may require some kind of Ritalin derivative. Or hypnosis. I'm open to suggestions, people. Anyway, I suppose that if I were to pick an alternate life, I would be interested to see what would have happened if I'd actually been driven to pursue any of these things in a serious way. Perhaps I would have been a champion weightlifter who wrote opera! Or a professional cat's cradle instructor! Damn.
What invention do you wish someone would invent?
I would like to skip this whole "hybrid vehicle", "alternative fuel", "carbon offsets" thing altogether and get someone to invent a teleportation device. The device would run on the blood of the innocent. Hahahahaaa! Just kidding. It would run on any kind of blood, regardless of innocence.
What accomplishment (if any) must you achieve to know that your life has meaning?
Winning NASCAR. It's like my white whale. Mainly because when I show up at the track, they keep trying to sell me bullshit like "You need to have a license" and "You're heavier than the actual racecar".
To what fictional place would you be willing to relocate?
I know you're all thinking I'd pick the world of Anne of Green Gables, but the truth is those people had to work hard and shit outdoors. Forget it. After due consideration, I must conclude that no fiction has stirred my imagination quite like Jasper Fforde's tales of Literary Detective Thursday Next. I would like to live in the world of Thursday Next, where literature replaces religion and I could have a pet dodo. I would also have a funny name, like "Fonda Squirrel". And I would work with Thursday at Jurisfiction, where I could leap in and out of any book ever written! I could spend a day at Hogwarts or tell Raskalnikov to get over himself! I could stop in for a plate of fried green tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Café! And before long, alert readers would notice Anne Shirley suddenly finding herself attracted to "the stout girl with the nut-brown hair, Grecian nose and blue-grey eyes who uses slang and scratches herself." Sign me up!
Speaking of signing up, here are the rules of the interview post. Participate - IF YOU DARE.
So, you wanna play along?
Leave me a comment saying, “Interview me, please.”
I will respond by emailing you five questions of my choosing.
You must update your blog with the answers to the questions. Whether you like them or not.
You have to include this explanation, and an offer to interview someone else in the same post.
When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.
So, there you go. Cheers.
