Call Me Egocentric

Call me egocentric, but...I love hearing stories about me and the things I did or the chain of events, decisions, etc. that I caused when I was little.

Just a few months ago I had the pleasure of hearing a story from my dad about me and my love of candy when I was little and a decision that he and my mom contemplated making (but ended up not following through with it).  See, when I was little, my sixth sense was being able to tell if there was anything sweet in the house.  I had a major sweet tooth.  If it existed, I found it.  And after finding it, whatever "it" may be, I gobbled it down hours after I had it in my possession.  Part of the reason was because I just wanted to eat all of it (it was SOOO good!), but the other reason was because I knew that if I were to get caught with it in my possession and there was still some left, that I would never see it again, and be corrected in some form or another.  When this general group of memories of me and my sweet-snatching days were brought up, my dad told me of an interesting (yet relevant) decision he and my mom contemplated.  Because I was such a good detective (haha) at finding any and every sweet thing in the house, they discussed possibly getting a safe to lock away all the candy and chocolate that they bought.  It would keep me from getting at it (for a time at least...haha ;), and they would also have been able to monitor when and how much who ate of it.


Tonight, I heard yet another interesting story from my years as a child.  My dad told me of when he and my mom went to my first parent-teacher conference for my Kindergarten class.  He was preparing himself to hear something like "what on earth possessed you to place that child into public school??".  When they got there and the teacher began talking to them, she began talking about what a nice, polite, and well-behaved child I was.  My dad told me that he actually stood up from where he was sitting, and said "What?"  To him, it was a completely unexpected statement/report.  At home I was such a terror (I can't even begin to describe to you what a nightmare of a child I was), but at school I was practically an angel.

I loved hearing this story, and thought it to be one of the funniest things ever.  It's such a fun thing to hear about the things I did when I was young and my parents reactions to them.  It's fascinating in general to hear any stories about anybody from their lives...especially of those who have lived so much longer than I and have such a storehouse of memories and tales from their past.

It's one of those things that if I ever had the opportunity to be able to sit and listen to tales of strangers' pasts, I'd do it in a heartbeat.