May I just tell you how much I hate having writer’s block? I really, really hate it. I mean, it has lasted for way too long and I want my writing mojo back. So here I am resorting to recycling another blog from back in the Myspace day (of which I will continue to do, but hopefully not only because I have no other material). But recycling is good. It helps the planet. The less time I leave my computer on the less my carbon footprint. So really, I am doing my part to save the Earth. You’re welcome.
But seriously though, this blog is a little back story on me. Very limited in information, but enough to let you know where some of my issues come from. Just some. You cannot just learn everything at once. Then what would you have to look forward to? I do have a confession though. For those who are going to expect part two, do not hold your breath. I never wrote it. Blame ADD, writer’s block or just shear laziness, I never really got around to it. Maybe I will now. Maybe my posting this will be the catalyst for me to write something new because I simply must write chapter two lest I let you down.
Who knows, I am not promising anything. All I hope is that you will get a little bit of a laugh, maybe a cry, but really I just hope people are reading this. Please read it. Read all my posts. Pass it along. I need to get a good following so I can get a book deal like Carrie Bradshaw and be able to buy shoes. I really, really want to buy some new shoes, and to be able to pay my mortgage. Not exactly in that order.
The Story of Me: The Life and Times of Palestine's Finest; Chapter One
On a fall night in 19__, in the desert city of Riyadh, just as morning prayers began, a Palestinian Princess was born, and God said the world is right.
Yes, it was I who was born that fateful October morning, and the world has been a better place ever since. Well, not noticeably yet, but it will once I have some power, money, and influence. It was the foreshadowing of good things to come is basically what I am getting at, okay, just work with me here.
Freakishly tall, even at birth, the nurse commented to my mother that I was going to be very tall. It is not every day that a newborn girl comes out a whopping 22 inches, and freakishly tall I became. And might I add, insanely smart and good looking, and not lacking confidence.
However it was not all peaches and cream at first, but what is life without struggle? I first disappointed my family (first in a long line of disappointments) by popping out a girl. They were expecting an Omar, but I came out a Yasmeen. Suckers. I was also, like many a newborn baby, quite ugly. Ugly enough to warrant my sister to tell my mother to take me back. Thankfully, she did no such thing. 22 years later, I grew out of ugly, and turned into the swan I always knew I was. All it took was to stop eating and putting a little makeup on, and getting rid of my glasses, braces, and getting control of my afro courtesy of my dear father's genetics, and a few other little tricks.
Hopes were high for my parents at first. I excelled at things at an early age. I walked and talked early, my mom started teaching me how to read at age one, and I was potty trained at 18 months and would have been sooner had it not been for my grandmothers ailing health that required my mothers attention. Yes, I was to be a writer, or a doctor, or a lawyer even. Something to make my Arab mother proud when she gets to tell people what her daughter does for a living knowing that deep down inside she is saying "my kid is better than yours." So let us just say that she is not so keen on the idea of saying her youngest daughter is an aspiring actor. Especially when other people are saying how their daughters are so successful, and have such a great job, and graduated college, blah blah blah. Now, I am not saying my mom is like that, but more so the Arab culture is like that. You show off through your kids, to show how wonderful you are that you gave birth to that. I am sure many other people relate.
Well, there was another disappointment. I excelled in elementary school in all things academic and artistic, even in P.E., which was one of my favorite classes, although I hate the gym now (more so on the transition later). Then things took a major turn. Junior high. Kids who were your friends were your friends no more, there were more kids who were bigger and meaner, and you were just thrown into it to either sink or swim. And sink I did, as though someone tied an anchor to my feet.
I hated junior high as much as I hate dirty feet (I REALLY hate dirty feet). It sucked major asshole, and the kids sucked more. The cliques were more apparent, and the judgments even worse. So, naturally, the more I sank into my own pit of despair, the peak of which was when one of my best friends was killed in a car accident, the more my grades suffered, and the more my parents were disappointed.
So, the actual confusion lay in the fact that I knew quite a bit of information, did well on tests, and truly was smart, however I never did my homework, and my grades did not reflect my intelligence, even in P.E. I did not do well, which was once one of my favorite classes, but alas, no more.
I had a heart murmur and the hooker of a P.E. teacher I had kept making me run the mile until I did it under 12 minutes. Well, the whole heart condition, which I later grew out of, did not allow for such a thing to happen, and she would not believe me. Until one day in the rain, on yet another attempt to make it under 12 minutes, I hyperventilated so badly I actually threw up. I totally blew chunks in some bushes by the track. Maybe I should have used that as a lesson to lose weight back then, but I digress. That was the last straw, and told her what happened: that I was never running again and would like to see her make me. Good times. This is why I hate the gym people, I am still traumatized by that incident. Looking back, I should have sued the school.
The only thing that got me through that hell of a school, and through another hell by the name of Tigard High School, which is another blog in and of itself, was my friend Heather who liked me even though I was fat and ugly and could not run to save my life. Thank goodness for Heather, for she gave me at least one good reason to actually go to school, and helped me go through high school. However the high school years will be left for another chapter from "The Story of Me: The Life and Times of Palestine's Finest."
But seriously though, this blog is a little back story on me. Very limited in information, but enough to let you know where some of my issues come from. Just some. You cannot just learn everything at once. Then what would you have to look forward to? I do have a confession though. For those who are going to expect part two, do not hold your breath. I never wrote it. Blame ADD, writer’s block or just shear laziness, I never really got around to it. Maybe I will now. Maybe my posting this will be the catalyst for me to write something new because I simply must write chapter two lest I let you down.
Who knows, I am not promising anything. All I hope is that you will get a little bit of a laugh, maybe a cry, but really I just hope people are reading this. Please read it. Read all my posts. Pass it along. I need to get a good following so I can get a book deal like Carrie Bradshaw and be able to buy shoes. I really, really want to buy some new shoes, and to be able to pay my mortgage. Not exactly in that order.
The Story of Me: The Life and Times of Palestine's Finest; Chapter One
On a fall night in 19__, in the desert city of Riyadh, just as morning prayers began, a Palestinian Princess was born, and God said the world is right.
Yes, it was I who was born that fateful October morning, and the world has been a better place ever since. Well, not noticeably yet, but it will once I have some power, money, and influence. It was the foreshadowing of good things to come is basically what I am getting at, okay, just work with me here.
Freakishly tall, even at birth, the nurse commented to my mother that I was going to be very tall. It is not every day that a newborn girl comes out a whopping 22 inches, and freakishly tall I became. And might I add, insanely smart and good looking, and not lacking confidence.
However it was not all peaches and cream at first, but what is life without struggle? I first disappointed my family (first in a long line of disappointments) by popping out a girl. They were expecting an Omar, but I came out a Yasmeen. Suckers. I was also, like many a newborn baby, quite ugly. Ugly enough to warrant my sister to tell my mother to take me back. Thankfully, she did no such thing. 22 years later, I grew out of ugly, and turned into the swan I always knew I was. All it took was to stop eating and putting a little makeup on, and getting rid of my glasses, braces, and getting control of my afro courtesy of my dear father's genetics, and a few other little tricks.
Hopes were high for my parents at first. I excelled at things at an early age. I walked and talked early, my mom started teaching me how to read at age one, and I was potty trained at 18 months and would have been sooner had it not been for my grandmothers ailing health that required my mothers attention. Yes, I was to be a writer, or a doctor, or a lawyer even. Something to make my Arab mother proud when she gets to tell people what her daughter does for a living knowing that deep down inside she is saying "my kid is better than yours." So let us just say that she is not so keen on the idea of saying her youngest daughter is an aspiring actor. Especially when other people are saying how their daughters are so successful, and have such a great job, and graduated college, blah blah blah. Now, I am not saying my mom is like that, but more so the Arab culture is like that. You show off through your kids, to show how wonderful you are that you gave birth to that. I am sure many other people relate.
Well, there was another disappointment. I excelled in elementary school in all things academic and artistic, even in P.E., which was one of my favorite classes, although I hate the gym now (more so on the transition later). Then things took a major turn. Junior high. Kids who were your friends were your friends no more, there were more kids who were bigger and meaner, and you were just thrown into it to either sink or swim. And sink I did, as though someone tied an anchor to my feet.
I hated junior high as much as I hate dirty feet (I REALLY hate dirty feet). It sucked major asshole, and the kids sucked more. The cliques were more apparent, and the judgments even worse. So, naturally, the more I sank into my own pit of despair, the peak of which was when one of my best friends was killed in a car accident, the more my grades suffered, and the more my parents were disappointed.
So, the actual confusion lay in the fact that I knew quite a bit of information, did well on tests, and truly was smart, however I never did my homework, and my grades did not reflect my intelligence, even in P.E. I did not do well, which was once one of my favorite classes, but alas, no more.
I had a heart murmur and the hooker of a P.E. teacher I had kept making me run the mile until I did it under 12 minutes. Well, the whole heart condition, which I later grew out of, did not allow for such a thing to happen, and she would not believe me. Until one day in the rain, on yet another attempt to make it under 12 minutes, I hyperventilated so badly I actually threw up. I totally blew chunks in some bushes by the track. Maybe I should have used that as a lesson to lose weight back then, but I digress. That was the last straw, and told her what happened: that I was never running again and would like to see her make me. Good times. This is why I hate the gym people, I am still traumatized by that incident. Looking back, I should have sued the school.
The only thing that got me through that hell of a school, and through another hell by the name of Tigard High School, which is another blog in and of itself, was my friend Heather who liked me even though I was fat and ugly and could not run to save my life. Thank goodness for Heather, for she gave me at least one good reason to actually go to school, and helped me go through high school. However the high school years will be left for another chapter from "The Story of Me: The Life and Times of Palestine's Finest."
Oh Yasmine, I'm so happy we became friends! Jr High was a shitty place and I'm glad we could face it together. <3
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