Do or Do Not.

You know what I like about memes? Yeah, yeah, sure–they give me just a little bit more insight into the pasts or psyches of my friends. But the important thing is that they keep me from having to think of topics to write about.

Saundra tagged me with the Childhood Memories Meme, and since I’m never one to turn down an excuse to keep from doing any real work for a few minutes, I’m game to give it a whirl. Away we go:

Remove the blog at #1 from the following list and bump every one up one place; add your blog’s name in the #5 spot; link to each of the other blogs for the desired cross-pollination effect.

1. Write on Right Now!
2. One Over-Caffeinated Mom
3. Blerg
4. Secrets & Lies
5. Do or Do Not

Next: select new friends to add to the pollen count. (Obviously no one is obligated to participate).

Hmmm, let’s see:

• Terry, of course.
• Michelle, since she has a shiny new blog and needs stuff to put on it. (Jay, you’re welcome to do it as well, but since your new blog’s photography-oriented I’m not gonna explicitly tag you.)
• Amy, returning the favor for her having tagged me with the last one of these things I did.

Then add your memories.

Five things I miss from my childhood:

1. Free time. I was an only child being raised by a single parent who worked full-time and had a life of his own to deal with, so I had plenty of free time to draw, to write, to learn how to do cool things with my Commodore 64/128, to read, to learn whatever I wanted to learn. I can honestly say that a great deal of who I am as a person today comes from having so much alone time when I was a kid. Nowadays I’m a husband and father of two, and free time can be hard to come by.
2. The time I got to spend with my dad, just me and him.
3. Grapico, the best vaguely-grape-flavored soft drink ever. (I had so much of it when I was a kid that I reached that point where I just couldn’t drink it anymore. But that doesn’t stop me from missing it now.)
4. Feeling like I was smarter than everyone else. I’m sure that sounds strange and more than a little egotistical, but being hella smart was just about the only thing I ever took much pride in when I was young. As I’ve gotten older, I haven’t used my brain as much as I felt like I should have, and that’s made me feel somewhat less bright. And now I work at a video game company where everybody is really friggin’ smart, which takes away some of that uniqueness I always used to feel. I know I’m still a really bright guy, but my identity isn’t quite as centered in my intelligence anymore…and I reckon there’s probably a little of both the good and the bad in that.
5. Starting back to school in the fall. So many kids hated it, but I loved it–I loved back-to-school shopping, getting new school supplies, starting new classes…and getting away from the excruciatingly hot and boring summertime.

So there ya go. Over to you, Terry, Michelle and Amy!