this IS a great thread!

Ollie - what decade would you wish to born in? I'm glad we're in the same book!

I can't do small talk either.
I have nothing to say about dish towels.
Someone once told me, and he didn't mean it as a compliment, that in a group setting either I was really quiet or else I would say something that was just way "out there."
In response I said "thank you."

I know I romanticize the previous decades and each one has its own crap, but I could see me in the 20s. The Jazz Age! Duke Ellington, Bessie Smith, Sippie Wallace...Smoking was cool, Women's Suffrage was at its crescendo, TV was invented then, but UNHEARD of, expatriates were going to Paris in droves ( I would have been amongst this disillusioned crowd along with T.S. Eliot and Gertrude Stein), Dali's art exhibits, vaudeville, communal spirit, hats, absinthe...

Or living in Crete in about 2348 B.C.E. would be cool, too.

Dish towels. Heh.

Thank god I'm not alone in my inability to converse in small talk. Though I think mine might be different...

I move into friendships quickly. I'll meet a stranger and want to be talking like we've been friends for 20 years. Maybe I have some sort of attachment disorder. O_o

I can count my friends on one hand. I move out of friendships quickly

Have a great weekend. I'm off to the beach for conference/vacation./ wish me luck on my "lifestyle change" carrying over to Orange Beach.

Peace.

Such a brilliant day today! It really lifted my spirits. I've had a blast. Great Friday. I saw this bird outside today. I've never seen a bird like it. Does anyone know what it is? My uneducated guess is some kind of falcon.



After that, I just had a great walk and read part of a good book (about Yoga!). I'm glad it was close enough and stuck around long enough for me to run back home and get my camera. I was feeling some stirrings of anxiety because I start my new job on Monday, but seeing that bit of beauty (and actually being able to capture it on film) and then just taking in the sun and the air and the wind made me feel more centered and able to just takes things as they come.

Ollie - Have fun on your beach break!

More on topic-ish, I too have an issue with small talk. I just don't see the point in it and always feel awkward when expected to participate in it. I don't see the point in communicating meaningless things that you don't really care about just to fill the time and silence. I can have an awesome time just sitting with a person without words more so than if they have to fill the silence with chatter. I guess that's why I have few friends, but the ones I do have are very close and appreciate a bit of quiet every now and again.

I don't really know what era I'd like to live in. I think sometimes that I'd like to live in the 60s for a while. That's mainly because that's the only time besides my own that I'm kinda familiar with. I'm not a really big history buff at all. I'd like to live in some romantic era I think. Well, I guess they all seem romantic in hindsight but that's the thought that comes to me.

What makes me alternative? Wow, where do I start...

I won't give you my life story. I've been overweight my whole life, and it never became apparent to me until I hit elementary school and the kids on the bus made fun of me. In high school, my views became cynical of the world, but for some reason I was still really nice to people. Still am. They just never let me be.

So, I found a way of life that works for me. Green living, vegetarian, humanitarian, gay rights advocate ("Are you gay?! Then why do you care?"), pagan, hippie, Gypsy-wannabe. My clothes still don't reflect at all how I feel on the inside. I used to be goth, and a part of me misses the clothes. Corsets, flowing skirts, chunky jewelry, jewel tones. I think once I hit conventional sizes, around 12 or 14, I'll start trying to make some of these clothes.

I also live in the south, and it boggles people to no end how I can be so "liberal". We have an evangelist who visits campus and has actually assaulted people with a bible (I ran and missed it, thankfully). I love everyone but I keep to myself. I open door for people struggling with their groceries and don't kid myself on whether or not they'll do the same. They won't. I'm open-minded and free and a hippy, witch, and gypsy and loving every moment of my life! Also I hate TV, can't get into conversations with my roommate about people's lives, and can care less about celebrities. I always think in terms of what's right and how it feels spiritually.

Frog--that looks like a falcon. Cool!!! This was in your yard? We have a hawk that hunts in our yard. It is so beautiful, but I'm always really nervous about the birds in our yard. I have a guide book at home, I'll see ifI can tell you what kind of falcon it is later. I love walks like the one you described. How is your new job?

Gaia--if you don't mind, what campus are you speaking of? Seems like I have read somewhere that evangelical dude somewhere.

wrdfrog- That's a Cooper's Hawk! Very cool!

Why do you consider yourself alternative and, if it has, how does this correlate with your previous lifestyle and present change?

Like another posted said, it probably has more to do with geography than anything. In a tiny midwestern farming community where everyone goes to church and the only Democrats are socially conservative union members, I'm a liberal atheist vegan.

I feel more myself lately than I have in years now that I'm finally shedding some of the excess pounds I put on during some rough years. That extra confidence makes it easier to try to connect with others locally who share my views.

I consider myself alternative because most of my views on certain things contradict most mainstream ideas. I'm pro-choice, pro-gay marriage, I dislike the vast majority of today's popular TV shows (lI love Flavor of Love, though), today's popular music, I am ridiculously liberal, I play the clarinet and piano instead of the guitar or drums. On top of all that, I am also Catholic, living in a predominately Muslim city (east Dearborn, MI).

I also enjoy wearing big black boots and dying my hair unnatural shades of red =)

Geography is such an important factor. I live in a town that had an anti-immigrant KKK rally last month. Nice, huh? There comes point where it gets harder to defend, harder to speak out and on some days, I just want to shut up, because atrocities such as this are in my face every 5 minutes. But I don't. This builds, I believe, a certain stamina/determination to go along with the alternative frame of mind.

Give it up for a Catholic pro-choice and pro-equal marriage!! *high fives purplekitty*

Woo hoo! *Does happy dance*

Geography is a HUGE factor. I was picked on a little bit for being Catholic, but what hurt my feelings the most is that a lot of my friends weren't even allowed to come over my house because of the whole religion thing. It sucked, but you live and learn the differences in cultures, ya know? I couldn't really be mad, it just sucked.

I couldn't imagine being near a KKK rally, that's really scary. I still don't understand how some people think that type of behavior is beneficial.

It is hard to speak up for what you believe in sometimes...In my Lifespan and Development Psychology class, a woman in my class was going on about how this particular transsexual professor at our college should be fired because "transsexuals rape children" and that "s/he would rape her kids"...When I spoke up about how transsexuals aren't necessarily rapists just because they're different, she threatened to kick my a**. I laughed.

I'm sorry, I'm still in shock over how insane that is to me. I suppose the only way to describe how I feel is to say that not being allowed to hang out with someone based on their religion is completely anathema to me. (However, here comes geography as a reason behind that, too!)

It reminds me of something this man once told in my Psychology class. He grew up in Texas, and apparently the curious people in their neighborhood were the Catholic family at one end of the street and the Jewish family at the other. It amused me to hear him say it, because he meant it in an "interesting" curious way.

It still surprises me that someone feels they can judge so much from a person based on one belief. Oh well, I guess there really are crazy-go-nuts people in the world like on that TV show on Fox (I think) that lady from Louisiana who traded houses with the family in Boxborough, MA, and totally flipped out over things that up where she was visiting weren't even given a second glance.

Crazy hypocritical world. Sure it's arrogant of me to say, but maybe some people are just here to remind us all how not to be. (I have to think that sometimes, or who knows? I might wake up one day like one of them O_O *Scary*)

That is insane!!! You would think that just being college would make someone more apt to want to expand their knowledge and understanding of what is beyond themselves and the proverbial horizon, but no, I am faced with that all the time. I gave a presentation in my Moral Values in Today's Society class on equal marriage rights and I heard similar disturbing things. Someone actually gave the line, "Murder happens all the time and it doesn't make it right, same with homosexuality." WTF?

And the thing with Religion---it's is getting worse! Learn from history, what? Nope. Sometimes, I just want to move away. I'm thinking Holland.

Faerie--unlike you I have lost all ability to be surprised at the ignorance so prevalent in today's society. Sometimes I wish I had it back, because that would mean I have a certain optimistic outlook on society...

I'm going to ditto your "WTF". Because, really, WTF?

I'm not saying that I'm complete unjaded. Maybe I'm just naive about some things that still go on

How the heck can someone say that being homosexual is just like KILLING someone?! That is completely ridiculous!

I've always seen it as if you're not gay, then don't have gay marriage! It's as simple as that! It's not like the government is going to force you to have one.

I really do like to try to see the best in people, but sometimes it's very hard.