Everyone has weird quirks. I have a few myself that may seem strange or odd. I am going to preface this article by saying that many of you may think that I’m a bit different or “touched” as the older women in my community would say. I’ll take that. But I know my real people will understand me. Let’s have a conversation about our quirks. If a psychologist is reading, let me know your thoughts! LOL Take a look at the short commercial below before you continue reading.
I remember when I first saw that commercial, so many years ago. That was back in the day when we had to watch commercials to get to the next part of the show. I don’t know why the commercial drew me in the way that it did when it started. I watched the commercial intently and by the end of the minute I was almost in a full cry. It was ridiculous. I felt ridiculous. For what reason would I cry about a lamp being thrown out? I had no other reasons to feel that emotional about this seemingly insignificant scenario.
At that moment, I realized that I give feelings to inanimate objects, personification. But it felt deeper than just giving an inanimate object personal or human characteristics. It’s the recurrence of this. This commercial depicted such a sad scenario. The lamp worked fine. The lamp was doing its job lighting the room and crushing its assignment. The lamp was removed from the house altogether, not repurposed in another room or offered an explanation as to why the new one was better (yup, I mean that). The lamp was sat out in the rain in what I assume was coldness, not understanding what it possibly could have done wrong to deserve such treatment. I felt so bad for the lamp (and honestly still do). Oddly, this is just one example of this weird quirk of mine.
Who has seen Toy Story? I fully believe that toys have feelings- don’t judge me. I’m a Winnie the Pooh FANATIC. I have a huge Winnie the Pooh that my husband bought me about 20 years ago. It’s still in immaculate condition. Kids are not allowed to play with him and if a kid wants to fight Pooh or throw him around, I don’t let them, because he’ll get “hurt”. Am I too old to believe this still? Y’all parents know toys are “real.” How many times have you heard a toy start glowing or making noise when no one else was in the room or touched it? It happens a lot.
Moving on-
Whenever I add paper to my printer, I add new paper to the back of the holder because I don’t want the new paper to skip the line. It only seems fair. The same goes for when I add new toilet paper rolls to the bathroom or anything else where there’s an “order” or line.
Any type of bean or vegetable coming from a can have to all come out of the can so they can fulfill their destinies (of being cooked of course)- weirdly, I don’t feel the same about cereal, chips or the like. Just discovered that as I wrote it. Hmm.
I won’t bore you (or concern you) with ALL of my wackiness, but I’ll list a few more: Money has to face the same direction; I tie candy wrappers into bows- now it’s pretty trash; when I hear short sentences, I always count the number of words in my head; when I read headlines on tv, I always look to see what letters the words have in common- see if they’re cosmically connected; I’m always counting windows (car windows, house windows- not tall buildings though- who has the time?); it’s like my fingers glow (in my mind) after I touch something outside of home or dirty in general, as a reminder that they’re dirty and need to be washed or sanitized (even pre-pandemic).
Having unread notifications drives me crazy. If anyone sends me a screenshot of something, the first thing I notice is if they have a banner of notifications at the top of their screen. I call out my siblings and husband all the time, like, please read that or swipe it off. It’s to the point they’ve become a bit self-conscious about sending me screenshots that include their notifications- I’m sorry y’all. I’m working on this though. LOL Everything doesn’t require my immediate attention and I don’t have to be so available all the time. It’s okay for non emergency things to sit for a bit. They’ve probably got it figured out and I’m the one who needs to get on board.
So, enough about some of the things that make me tick. I think if my quirks aren’t adversely affecting my life or how I interact with people, they’re ok. As I’ve said though, there are a couple that I’m working on because who has the time to deal with them and it’ll free up some mental space.
Don’t judge me-
What kinds of quirks do you have?
-Live, Laugh, Love 💙-
AJ DOM
AJ D.O.M. 