Don't tell anybody, but I usually spend the first half hour of my workday screwing around on the internet and being unproductive; this is mostly because I am always the first person into the office every day and because mornings tend to be slow (probably because everyone else is screwing around on the internet, too). This morning, I got an email from my mom that included this: Crow and Cat

Unbelievable, right? It sort of throws a wrench into the nature vs. nurture debate, or at least adds another element to it. Anyway, I just wanted to share.

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Have you ever been someone who was scared of everything that was, or could be construed, as even a little off-kilter? Like wearing plaid socks that might end-up being visible when you sat down? Or like having parents who implemented a 10pm curfew when you were a a senior in high school so you pretended that you just didn't actually WANT to be out late anyway? That's how I was. I also embarrassed really easily, which made me less than open about just about everything.

Like sex and anything related to it.

I was still scared of penises when I was a senior in high school, and I was utterly convinced that if anyone was going to be the victim of immaculate conception ever again (no offense intended), it was going to be me. I was equally convinced that the first time I had sex I would get pregnant and they'd put me on one of those trashy MTV shows about good kids who managed to somehow fuck up big time. Sometimes, when I was feeling especially masochistic, I would play out a scene where all my family's friends were gathered around, shaking their heads, and saying, "She had such a bright future...I just didn't see this coming. She was always such a smart girl..." I also figured I'd have to move far away and not talk to anybody I knew ever again. Looking back at my youth now, and seeing how many complexes I gave myself, I'm shocked that I'm even half as well-adjusted as I turned out (which is not extremely, but I do all right).

Most of them came from being frightened of everything but my shadow, and maybe even that at night if I were half asleep and trying to stumble into my bathroom. I made it worse by never actually owning up to being frightened of everything, and I'm fairly certain that that misstep is what gave me complexes. I used to work very hard to put up a facade of suave, untouchable, coolness. I tricked most people with it, because I was a control freak and kept myself in an iron-tight grip, but I was stressed-out all the time. It was a tough existence! I constantly had to anticipate and predict any bumps on the road that would force me into patch-up mode so that people didn't actually figure out that I was a huge, lame, weenie. This made me every girl's best friend in high school and an enormous bitch to just about every guy. Which somehow managed to work out for me, anyway...which still puzzles me enormously.

That is why, with the dawn of 2011, my biggest goal might just be to be open and up-front about myself with myself and with other people. (Can I get a "HELL yes")? So far, I'm doing pretty well.