My Story in Lists| Favorite Toys I had as a Child

Times are so different now. Back when I was a child, toys were something we mainly were given only at Christmas or birthdays. Still we had a lot as compared to most of the world and I never felt wanting.

The first toy that I have a special memory of was our toy horse Blaze. It was a beautiful black and white stallion that we would pretend was real. Even at my young age, I knew that we were so lucky to have such an extra special horse. More regal than a typical rocking horse, Blaze would move back and forth in a galloping motion so we could imagine we were really riding in the wind.

Eliz and I had many a fight over Blaze. She would wait patiently for us, always staying neutral (though I swore she liked me best), always giving the best rides, never tiring of us climbing upon her as we traveled to new lands. She remains one of the few toys I wished I still had.

My Story in Lists|Cars I've Had Part V

After years of car payments and nothing to show for them after the payments were over and done with, it was so great to own my car outright. But several years after my last payment was made, I began to get that itch. It would happen whenever I passed a VW Bug Convertible. My thoughts became words and one October day in 2008, just for fun, I took Brie with me to a VW dealership just so we could test drive some cars.

I wasn't planning to come home with a new car. I had already priced them out and knew the payments would be more than I was willing to commit to. What I wasn't counting on was seeing a pre-loved certified model that was too hard to resist. I test drove the car, talked price, went home, ran some numbers, called the ins company, ran some more and hightailed it back to the dealership.

We drove home with the top down in red VW convertible, laughing all the way home. I felt like pinching myself. Ever since I was in college I wanted a bug convertible. Now I had one. And I still had my RAV-4. Two cars. It was crazy.

As we drove home, I told Brie that I didn't want my convertible to be like a swimming pool that people want and when they finally get one they never use it. I was going to put the top down as much as possible. And I do. Spring and fall days are the best. Even warm winter days are pretty good, too. Almost four years later and I still love driving around in it, still take too many pictures of it.

No, it's not perfect, it is a VW after all so it can't take the abuse I gave to my Toyotas, but still it makes me happy. There is nothing like driving home with the top down after a long day at work. There's nothing like actually hearing someone call a slug bug as we drive by (yes, we have literally heard people do this on more than one occasion).

My Story in Lists| Cars I've Had Part IV

Part of the deal when I got my powder blue Corolla was that I was to make the final payment. Dad had leased the car and he was making the monthly payment, but at the end of year three, I would need to have several thousand dollars saved up. At that time of my life, I was horrible...horrible...at saving money. At the end of the lease term, I was no closer to the final payment then I was at the beginning.

The leasing agent had began calling me several months before the lease was up and I was ignoring the calls because I didn't know what I was going to do. I didn't think I had the credit I needed to buy a car, but somehow, someway, I did. So right after Christmas, I headed up North to visit dad in Vancouver with a car brochure in hand and I ordered me up another Corolla. I felt like a big girl. I was already in my 30's so it was about time.

This time my car was green (green!?!) and I naively got it sight unseen. Didn't even take it for a test drive. I was just so relieved at having a car, let alone another new car, that I just signed on the dotted line. For the next three years I made my payments faithfully. God was so faithful to me, providing me with a job that paid the bills and with a job that included increases so that I wasn't living so much month-to-month.

While I liked the car, it really wasn't the car I would have chosen had I known I had options. Somewhere in the middle of my lease, I fell in love with another Toyota model, known as a RAV-4. By this time, SUVs were highly popular. I liked them as much as the rest of the U.S. population, but wasn't interested in the price tag or the cost of gas. A RAV-4 offered me the look of a SUV, with the price and gas mileage closer to my Corolla.

When the lease was up, I jumped at the chance to trade in the Corolla for a RAV-4, white, if you please. Matt and I were so excited. Matt, because the back seats folded back so he could nap in the back seat if he were ever vanqueshed to the back. I loved that I was sitting up higher than most standard cars, had a little bit of a cargo area and had a car I felt like I chose instead of taking what I thought I should take.

The only thing I didn't like was that, once again, I was leasing a car which meant by the end of the term I would have to come up with a big payment or lease again. I felt trapped and really wanted to get away from having monthly payments for a while. I was happy to learn at the end of my lease with the RAV-4 that I could extend my payments for another year and pay off the car. I opted to do that and after seven years of payments, I finally owned a car outright.

My Story in Lists|Cars I've Had Part III

After Matthew was born, dad decided that his grandson needed to be in a safer car than a soda pop can with four tires and a steering wheel. On a sunny Saturday afternoon, we strolled down to the end of the street and walked up the access road where people in the neighborhood parked the used cars they wanted to sell to take a look. There in the sunlight was a sweet looking bright red Subaru DL with everything a girl making less than the average Joe could want.

Four doors, A/C (my first car with this luxury), power window, it was a dream come true at the time. It was a 5-speed, but that was not a problem since I had long mastered a manual transmission. Before I knew it, I was driving the car back home. Like my other two cars, it was a good little car. Unfortunately, the previous owners must have painted it with nail polish right before they sold it because before the summer was over, my car looked like it had some sort of disease. The clear coat over the red cracked so it looked like there were vericose veins all over my car. There were more than a few times that I found a business card from a body shop on my windshield.

That, alone, wasn't so bad because once I got inside, I could at least pretend it looked as pretty as the day I got her. The real problem was that the brake pads would wear down in less than six months. Seriously, I was replacing those things constantly. I had my dad, my brother-in-law, my then boyfriend at the time all taking turns replacing my brakes. Even then, I still went through my rotors at least four times because I waited too long to get them repaired. My boyfriend was convinced it was the way I drove. I kept telling him that I never had that problem with my other two cars, but he wouldn't buy it. It was probably a good thing that we didn't get married after all.

About a year after I finally got rid of the car, I saw a Consumer Report article which rated the Subaru and it got good to excellent ratings on everything...but the brakes! Can you say, vindicated??

One day right before Christmas, I got home from work and my dad had one of the biggest surprises for me that I ever had. He wanted to take me to buy me a new car for Christmas. He only asked that I not get red car, to which I wholeheartedly agreed. To this day, I never really knew what possessed him to do get me a car. I could tell my mom wasn't really enthused by the idea. I was making better choices, but I still had some growing up to do. I've always given my Uncle Bob credit for the deal. He had a way of sweet talking my dad into some crazy ideas. Or maybe dad felt bad because of what he perceived to be his part in my breakup with Steve.

I was so afraid it was just some cruel joke, but that same night we headed over to the Toyota dealership and within a few hours, my Subaru was left, squealing brakes and all (I was, once again, in need of brakes and probably new rotors) in the lot as I drove a brand spanking new light blue Toyota Corolla back to the house, screaming at the top of my lungs, all the way. In a million years, at that time of my life, I never thought I would actually own a car that had a genuine new car smell.

My Story in Lists|Cars I've Had Part II

After slinking home on the Greyhound, I was in need of another car. In fairness to me, I had checked the oil before the drive up to San Luis Obispo, but the damage had long been done and that trip was just too much for my little Capri.

Luckily for me, Eliz had been making much better choices and as a gift for her pending graduation from college, mom and dad were planning on buying her a brand spanking new car. With a grown up job in the horizon, she would make the monthly payments, but they would make the initial down payment. This meant I would inherit the reddish orange, Datsun 510 that three others in our family had already owned.

My Aunt Vickie was the originally owner of the car. I remember driving in it with her when I was little and it was still shiny and new. It was my Aunt's pride and joy as it was the first new car she ever bought. Sometime later, my Uncle Bob bought the car because buying used cars was his hobby. When mom and dad were ready to buy a car for Eliz, they bought the Datsun from Uncle Bob. It was a good, reliable car with great gas mileage. Not as sporty looking as my Capri and by this time, definitely looking worn (the sun visors had long broken off and the paint was faded), but beggars (me) can't be choosers.

I didn't treat the Datsun much better than the Capri. One spring day, I played hooky from work and drove up to SLO to catch up with some friends when just outside of Nipomo, my car suddenly made a strange little noise. The next thing I knew I was pulling the car over to the side of the road. I didn't know what to do. We didn't have cellphones at the time. I knew I was in a pile of trouble so I did the only thing I could do, I started walking towards the exit which was just ahead. I had taken no more than 10 steps when a Greyhound bus came down the highway and pulled over to the emergency lane. The kind bus driver asked if I could use a ride. As it turned out, the bus was in route to SLO so the driver told me he would take me there for free. I could not believe my luck. Now I know it was the prayers that my grandmother had prayed for me.

I was able to get my friends to come to the bus stop to pick me up and then called my cousin Mark who made a four hour ride up the 101 in the late afternoon to try to help me out. Unfortunately, the car needed more than anything we could do at that time of night so we left the car by the side of the road and headed back home. Dad was furious with me when I told them what happened and the next day mom, dad and I drove up to Nipomo to see about getting my car back. It was a silent, uncomfortable ride punctuated by periods of time in which dad was (rightly) chewing me out. For so many years I had been towing the line and suddenly I was making one horrible decision after another.

We arrived to the spot in the road where my car broke down to find...nothing. My car had been impounded which added to dad's displeasure. We were able to get the car out of impound costing a small bounty and find a mechanic who was willing to fix the car. Why dad helped me the way he did, I don't know. Mom probably made him. But he did and I kept the car until Matthew was born and dad decided that his grandson needed to be in something safer than a soda can with wheels. 

My Story in Lists|Cars I've Had

In our family, we received a car upon graduation of high school with acceptance to college. Mom and dad never said the college part was a requirement, but since it was a given that we were going to get our degree, I assumed that it was part of the deal.

My first car would be what Matthew would refer to as a ghetto car, only better. It was red. It was sporty. It was a stick shift. It was a Ford Capri. It looked similar to a Mustang. My friends called it a Crapi but that was all my fault. In my youth I abused my cars horribly. My Capri was no exception.

We found the car by chance. My uncle who lives up the street from us knew we were on the hunt for a car and someone on his block had a car for sale. Mom took care of the transaction as dad was still in Texas with the boys which was a pretty big deal for her. For me, the big deal was that it was a stick shift and I had never driven one before. Since it was going to be my mode of transportation, it was imperative that I learn.

Luckily for me, mom knew how to drive a stick shift. She learned shortly after she married my dad on an old VW Bug they bought. Also luckily for me, mom is a thousand times more patient than I am. I didn't do well with all the jerking during take off and the clutch on the car was pretty touchy so it wasn't an easy car to learn with. It often felt like a bucking bronco. But learn I did.

There were scary moments as I learned how to move from neutral to first and then second, like the time Eliz, my cousin Mark and his cousin went with me to Disneyland. I still wasn't consistent with the clutch and my take offs made it appear as though the car had violent seizures. Looking back, I suppose it was brave of me to drive, or stupid...whichever.

As we left Disneyland, the exit was one with the prongs sticking out of the driveway to prevent vehicles from attempting to enter. We were so scared that the traffic would stop such I would end up right in front of the prongs and as I would start off in first gear I would jerk forward and then backwards, puncturing my tires leaving us in a horrible predicament. Fortunately, that didn't happen and we lived to tell the tale.

Once I got the hang of the manual transmission, there was no stopping me. I really liked my car, but that didn't stop me from being hard on it. Still, I had some good times with that car.

There was the time that I was driving on highway 71 with my best friend Leslie. It was a foggy night and like always I was going faster than I should have when suddenly this white looking apparition appeared to come up from the road. I slammed on the brakes and whatever it was seemed to come up through the bottom of my car in a white haze.

Leslie and I were screaming as my brain tried to make some sense out of what was happening because as much as I thought a ghost was coming up from the floor boards, I knew it couldn't be true. I suddenly realized that the fire extinguisher must have discharged and that's what was causing the white haze to travel about the vehicle. Our screams turned into hysterical laughter and for months the powdery substance stuck to everything and everyone who sat in the passenger seat.

Worse than that was the fact that I rarely never put engine oil in my car. My negligence cost me dearly. One day as Leslie and I were driving from school to downtown Los Angeles, a loud clunking sound begun to come from the engine. At first I thought someone had put a bag of rocks or boulders in the hood of my car. My first inclination was to turn the radio up and hope for the best, but the sound persisted and since we happened to be coming up to the off-ramp to my house, we agreed it would be best to get off the freeway. It was a good thing because as we coasted through the intersection my car just died.

We got out to push the car through the light and some nice guy came and helped. Funny enough as we were pushing the car through the intersection, we saw a friend of ours whiz by. He drove by without even slowing down. When we asked him about it later, he laughed and told us that it looked like we had things under control.

For the life of me, I can't remember how I got the car home, but somehow I did. A few days later my grandfather and Uncle Joe stopped by the house to take a look at the car. My uncle gently asked me when it was that I last checked the oil. Checked the oil??? But the oil light hadn't come on. Turns out there was not a drop of engine oil in my car. They filled it up, told me that they wouldn't tell my dad (who was in Indonesia at the time) and it started up, but it wasn't the same after that. I was able to drive it for over another year until it broke down for good. This time as I drove up the 101 with another friend on our way to SLO (San Luis Obispo). Not a fun time at all.

My Story in Lists|Things I'm Afraid of Part II

As far back as I can remember, I've been afraid of heights and falling. The problem is, that as a little girl, I would create a self-fulfilling prophecy where I would actually fall.

When I was four or five, we went to the park with most of my extended family. I don't know where this park was located, but it had a small zoo and hiking area incorporated on the grounds. My sister, Eliz, was going for a walk with some of my other family members, but I wasn't allowed to tag along so I comforted myself by going to the playground.

It had one of those rock ship slides where you climb up a ladder from one level to another. Just two steps up the ladder I became afraid of falling so inexplicably, I let go of the ladder and fell straight back, landing with a thud on the sun baked sand. Even though it wasn't a long drop, I was only two or three steps up, I could feel the wind knock out of me and I lay on the sand crying. For some odd reason, I did the only thing I could think of, burying the prize from the Cracker Jack box that I earlier opened into the sand.

Then in first grade, I did it again. It was on the first day of school, during our first recess. I climbed up to the monkey bars. I had climbed them many times before but for some reason this time, I moved my arms across two bars and hung there, afraid of falling. Once, again, I just let go, falling like a rag doll to the ground. The aide came to my rescue, telling me not to move while they got the principal. After some discussion, it was decided that I could get up, but they would send me home for the day. I was brokenhearted because this meant I would not be able to eat lunch in the cafeteria out of my Barbie lunchbox that mom had bought me.

I was a weird, weird child. I can't explain why I purposefully let go each time thus ensuring that the thing I was afraid of would happen, but I think that's why I can't stand to be at the edge of a steep fall. How can I be sure that I won't just suddenly let go?

My Story in Lists|Things I'm Afraid of

Last week I was up North visiting my sister. Like normal, since I'm not limited to one bag and a carry-on, I tend to over pack. This trip was no exception. Laptop, iPad, iPad keyboard and Listography, My Book of Lists were all in tow as I had planned to spend my down time writing. Who would know that there would be no down time?

My Listography book caught Christie's eye. And why wouldn't it? It's bright and cheery, interesting looking. Just looking at it makes me happy and encourages me to write.

She asked about it and I explained what it was for. Showing her some examples, I turned to the Page which read...things I'm afraid of. I had just one thing listed, lizards. I am terrified of lizards. They make me shudder, literally. I don't like that I see them on warm and sunny days almost all the time now. I love that Belle is around because she can be my protector from those creepy, slithery things.

I blame part of my fear on what happened in Puerto Rico. Even as a 2nd/3rd grader, I never really cared for them, but I didn't shudder at the sight or thought of lizards. Until one day when Victor found the smallest lizard I ever saw. It was so slight that the skin was almost translucent. Vic was about six years old at the time and he had it in the palm of his hand, taunting me with it, lifting it up towards my face as I insisted that he leave me alone.

Finally, in desperation, I shoved my brother's hand away from my face and in doing so, the lizard went flying through the air and my brother losing his balance took a step backwards, squashing that poor little lizard to death. He cried, Greg and Eliz got mad at me and I was indignant and grossed out by the whole thing. As an adult, I feel badly about it, but from that moment on, my fear of lizards grew exponentially.

I explained to Christie that I was afraid of other things, but at the time I wrote on the page of fears, only one thing came to mind. During the next day as we explored the streets of San Francisco, many of my other fears came to meet me, face-to-face.

The fear of driving across long bridges. 

I hate, hate, hate driving across them. I'm okay with short bridges, the kind that you can clearly see the other side as you start across the water.

Kind of like the Rainbow Bridge pictured above, but the Golden Gate or the Bay Bridge? I get queasy. It doesn't help to know that part of the Bay Bridge collapsed during the SFO earthquake.

I'm afraid of heights, looking down from a high place. I can't get near the edge, even when I know there is a barrier or enclosure. I'm afraid that it won't hold or that for some unknown reason I will hurl myself off the edge. On 9/11, I was horrified by the jumpers on the Trade Centers. I couldn't imagine the pain and suffering they must have felt to jump to their death. They were living my nightmare and those images will haunt me forever.