Joel Sax of the blog Pax Nortona, Twitter handles @EmperorNorton and @Bipolar_Blogs and all over the Internet since 1988, challenged me to list 50 things about me. I’m going to boast a lot in this interminable list. Forgive me. I also cheated by listing each city I’ve lived in. I could have listed each job I’ve held rather than each career and far exceeded 50 items. Here goes:
- I was born in San Francisco.
- I lived in Saudi Arabia for five years as a child.
- When I was seven, we moved to Cambridge, MA.
- Later, we moved to Rancho Palos Verdes, CA.
- Later, we moved to Valley Forge, PA.
- Then we briefly lived in West Los Angeles.
- Then we moved to Hermosa Beach, CA. I’ve lived with my parents in Hermosa Beach at various transitional times as an adult, too.
- I went to four elementary schools (in Saudi Arabia, MA, & CA).
- I went to one middle school in CA and one junior high in PA.
- I went to three high schools. That’s nine schools total before I graduated from high school.
- As an adult, I’ve lived in Westwood, CA…
- Berkeley, CA
- Oakland, CA
- Manhattan Beach, CA
- San Francisco, CA
- Benicia, CA
- Kentfield, CA
- Petaluma, CA
- Laguna Niguel, CA
- Eugene, OR
- Helendale, CA
- Mission Viejo, CA
- I have bipolar disorder.
- I’m a mother to a teen boy.
- I’ve been married since 1997, so I am capable of a stable relationship if not geographic stability. We move together.
- My husband and I met in 1994 as I was recovering from a psychotic break.
- Although I had moved back in with my parents at the time, the man who became my husband described me as the most independent woman he had ever met.
- I’m a proud geek.
- I love math and database design.
- I first designed a website in 1994.
- I was a drama geek.
- I love public speaking.
- I’m a performer, or more aptly a diva, at heart.
- I gave the eulogies at both of my maternal grandparents’ memorials.
- Here I totally boast: I got 100% on my math placement exam as an incoming freshman at UCLA.
- I started off college as an honors biochemistry major at UCLA.
- I regret not continuing my study of mathematics beyond a year of honors calculus at UCLA.
- I was suicidal when I attended UCLA.
- I attended a community college after quitting UCLA.
- I ended up graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in Legal Studies from UC Berkeley.
- I have a Master of Arts in Psychology from New College of California.
- I am a California Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist.
- I attended Fuller Theological Seminary, but did not complete my degree.
- My career history is just as flaky as my education and roving lifestyle. First I was a legal assistant.
- Then I worked as a nonprofit administrator.
- Then as a psychotherapist.
- Then in commercial real estate.
- Until I was hospitalized at the age of forty-one.
- I have been on disability since that hospitalization.
- I’ll be fifty-two in August.
[…] of this post for outing her husband about that. This meme thing has appeared made the rounds with Kitt, Sass, Tessa, and of course E. I wanted to do this since Kitt posted hers, but coming up with 10 […]
You’re very interesting. I’m going to enjoy reading your blog. Thanks for noticing little me. ~DM
My pleasure.
Thank you so much for stopping by my Blog and to decide to follow I will follow back! I hope that you enjoy my Art 🙂
Your jewelry is gorgeous. I’ve liked and followed your social media presences. To what extent I’m able to actively follow and comment depends on my time. I’m pretty swamped and overextended.
Thank you so much that’s very nice of you I am happy that you like my Jewelry 🙂
[…] Gentle Kindness Kitt O’Malley […]
Would you mind if I did this on my blog? I hate to be a copycat, but I really liked it.
Please copy. I’d be thrilled to learn 50 things about you.
Such cool facts, so many questions. And I didn’t see any boasting in there…
Thanks!
Hi Kitt. I’m really intrigued by the time you spent in Saudi Arabia and the South Bay (Manhattan Beach.) I lived there and Hermosa two summers when I played beach volleyball. I’ve had a lot of careers that I loved too and eventually I had to apply for disability when I feel into a suicidal depression in 2007. They backdated me to 2003 and I paid my credit cards off. Even though I had been working during that time. They take bipolar disorder very seriously. It’s amazing how many people don’t! Allison
Small world. I went to high school living on the Strand in North Hermosa Beach near the Manhattan Beach border, and lived in Manhattan Beach briefly after I graduated from Berkeley. Lots of champion volleyball playing happening in the South Bay. Great flat sandy beaches for it. Saudi Arabia has plenty of sand, as well, but the weather is horrible. So hot. Sand storms really suck.
Thank you for sharing that with us, that took some courage to reveal so much about yourself.
I’ve always been open, perhaps too open. Just my personality. Takes no bravery when God made you that way.
Wow! A full and interesting life. Thank you for sharing.
Apologies if this is too nosey a question, but how do you think moving so much as a child has affected you? You mentioned what your husband said about you being independent.
There are positives and negatives. I’m adaptable to new situations. On the other hand, I always have one foot in and one foot out of social situations. I can bond, but I remain an outsider, an observer. I’ve developed an aversion to joining groups, and prefer privacy and to be an individual without strong group ties.
Aside from my friends from high school (for the first time in my life I found a group of “outcasts”, my tribe, they accepted and loved me unconditionally and I owe a great deal to them, one of them I owe my life to) and a couple of best friends since then, I tend to just walk away when I move. I do not look back and try to maintain friendships.
I often forget peoples names. In fact at UCLA, I was elected Vice Chair of the Social Committee of College Honors because two girls on the committee remembered me from middle school. I had NO idea who they were. I just pretended I remembered them so as not to insult them. They were REALLY nice and effusive and welcoming. I felt horrible that I could not recall them. But, too much for me to process and recall. Too many changes. Too many people.
My husband, who moved a lot, too, remembers every name, every friend, every neighbor, every school teacher. He revisits old haunts whenever we are in his old towns. Drives me nuts. I couldn’t give a sh*t. It’s just annoying.