Little-known facts

Some of these are so little-known that even the Romgi might be surprised.

• I rub my eyes when I go to bed. Not in a light “Oh, I’m sleepy” way, but more like smashing my hands into my eyeballs. I have trouble feeling sleepy or drowsy, so the vigorous eye-rubbing actually helps me get ready to go to sleep. Unfortunately, I took it a little too far. When I was pregnant with jr I rubbed my eyes so hard, so much, that I had to stop wearing contacts because my eyes were sore all the time. I gave the eye-rubbing up for a while after that. Now I try to be a little more restrained.
• I like to doodle in class if the conversation or lecture isn’t fast-paced, but I refuse to draw on my actual class notes. I have a separate section of my notebook set apart for doodling.
• Before having kids I worried a lot about pretty much everything. One of my real fears was that a car would crash through our bedroom window (remember we live in the basement, and our window is right at ground level). Now my biggest fear is that I will never, ever get enough sleep for the rest of my life.
• Actually, I do have another fear: moldy bread. I carefully examine each piece of bread before I eat it (or make it into a sandwich for the Bwun), even if the loaf is brand-new.
• Lately it’s really difficult for me to fall asleep. There’s just too much going on in my head. I have trouble not running through lists of all the class readings, papers, law school events, playgroups, and loads of laundry that fill up my week. To force my brain to slow down, I compose blog posts in my head at night. Most of the blog posts you read were “written” around 2am.
• This one is kind of weird. (The other things were all normal, right?) I was trying to explain to the Romgi recently how I visualize my mental space. Even as I started the conversation the Romgi was giving me odd looks. Here’s what it comes down to: I see my mental space as a 3D area mostly above my head, and different types of thought take place at different locations within this space. For example, when I talk to people, I visualize my speech just above my forehead but projected outward, because those thoughts are moving toward a concrete reality (in being spoken to someone else). Difficult abstract concepts, such as from my sociological theory class, are placed behind the top of my head, out-of-reach. They’re hard for me to grasp and I feel like I need to reach into this abstract field and move the thoughts forward in order to understand them.
• I also visualize a calendar when I think of time. First, I have a monthly calendar, which looks like your standard wall calendar, but the weeks are staggered diagonally so that each week is slightly more forward in space than the previous. Second, the months fit together in a similar pattern; progressing through December at the bottom of the year-long calendar, each month is inset slightly to give a sense of forward movement. Third, the days themselves start at the bottom with 6am and move through the day upward until midnight. After this peak, the late-night/early-morning hours move downward until the start of a new day at 6am again. Confusing? Look at a typical daily planner with hourly intervals marked off. The way I see it, those are all wrong. My day starts with 6am and builds UP. Daily planners build DOWN.
• I’m not sentimental. I don’t keep mementos or buy souvenirs.
• Today I learned that I absolutely hate playing chess. Sorry, the Romgi.