O: 11/7/02

Work Diary, 11/7/02

Things My Big Sister Told Me That Turned Out Not To Be True:

1. "You have a third nipple." Actually, it was just a mole. As an
adult, it turned darker and became a funny shape, so I had it removed.
The resulting scar is perfectly round and more nipple-like than
ever.

2. "You can sit on clouds." A belief I had until the age of eleven,
when a thick, soupy fog descended on Houston and, miraculously, I was
able to walk right through it. The realization that a cloud wouldn't
support me was one of my sadder coming-of-age moments.

3. "Potato chips are made by people who sit at long tables, chew up
potatoes, and then spit them out into molds." So visually disgusting
that I had a visceral response to this announcement and, to this day,
still view potato chips with suspicion.

4. "If you say 'I don't believe in Bloody Mary' ten times and then look
in a mirror, your face will be covered in blood." This started after
our father took us to see "The Exorcist" when I was in Kindergarten.
During the movie, my sister fled up the aisle while I stayed glued to
my seat, watching Linda Blair spew vomit and rotate her head like some
sort of demonic owl. We may not have been religious but Satan was under
every bed and behind every door.

5. "If you run around in a circle while somebody hits you in the butt
with a board, you'll start flying." Unfortunately, I stayed decidedly
earthbound with my sore bum.

6. "If you eat that last candy bar, all of your teeth will fall out."
It's time I face up to the fact that my sister and I were pigs, eating
anything with a high sugar content and - sometimes - pure sugar itself.
In fact, I did lose most of my baby teeth while eating a Marathon Bar
at the movies, leaving the theater with a pronounced lisp and several
bloody tooth sockets.

7. "Babies come out of belly buttons. Since you have a belly button,
you can have babies." Probably why the pain of childbirth has always
made sense to me. All I had to do was picture a baby's head coming
through my belly button and everything fell into place.

8. "Baby aspirin is really just orange candy." Tasted like it, too,
though orange candy didn't put you in the hospital with a tube in your
stomach.

9. "If you swallow your gum, it will stay in your stomach forever." I
still can't swallow gum - literally. I've tried and my throat seizes up
and I gag.

10. "You were adopted." Surely something most kids hear from older
siblings. I didn't quite believe it, but then I'd look at my father
sitting on the couch in his underwear, drunk and crying over old Elvis
re-runs. My possible adoption was probably the beginning of the
optimism I have as an adult.