Creative Writing Exercise

Every now and again I get a huge case of writer's block and there are gazillions of sites out there with blog prompts or quizzes to get the brain engaged. Most wind up as forwards on MySpace bulletins, but here's one I liked since I'm having creative brain freeze.

Your Autobiography

Part 1: The Birth of You
--Were you a planned baby?: Yep. My mom and dad were planned to the nth degree when it came to family planning. They even had my sister by design five years later so they wouldn't be paying for two college tuition bills at the same time.
--Were you the first?: Yes.
--Were your parents married when you were born?: Yep, in 1963.
--What is your birthdate? I was born in February, on the 15th in 1966.

Part 2: The Family
--How would you describe your family?: My "nuclear family" growing up couldn't have been more suburban normal, my extended family on my dad's side had the best quirky relatives, but my mom's side provided my Uncle Jack who kept every holiday interesting.
--Are your parents married? My dad died in 1979, and my mom remarried many years later.
--What are your siblings names?: Jill is my sister, and she married Shane. My sister-in-law Jodie is married to Stephen.
--Which parent do you get along with best?: My mom...but then again I don't really have other options. But when my dad was alive it was easily him.

Part 3: The Friends
--Do you have more than one best friend?: My wife is truly my best friend.
--What do you like to do when you are together? Laugh and goof on each other, mostly. But there's something about being in the same room with her, even if we're not doing anything, that I like.
--Do you share the same interests?: Not really, but it's the differences we have that really attract me to her.
--Which friend can you tell anything to?: There are things that go on in my brain that I hold to myself so I don't tell anybody everything. However, I can tell my wife most everything.

Part 4: Your Personality
--How high/low is your self esteem?: Oh my gosh. Deep down I have a huge ego. I've learned to keep it concealed in a general sense but it oozes out more than I care to admit.
--Do you get depressed about things easily?: Way too fast. I can go from 60 to zero in seconds.
--Are you happy?: I never envisioned myself being this happy on a consistent basis.
--Do you live life to the fullest?: As full as you can living in the suburbs.

Part 5: Appearance
--Are you comfortable with the way you look?: More or less but I really don't care. There isn't anything I can do about it.
--Would you change anything about your apperance if you could? I'd drop 20 pounds and get back to where I was in college.
--Do you have any piercings? Not anymore. I've considered getting four or five in my left ear on occasion but I don't even take myself seriously on that front anymore. I doubt I'll ever do it.
--Describe your hair? long & strawberry blonde. It's a strange color, though. I've had complete strangers, ladies, who've walked up to me and asked me where I got that particular color. My response usually goes, "Ma'am, I'm a GUY. I don't color my hair, unless Pert Plus over time has some secret coloring agent that blends in over about 20 years."

Part 6: The Past
--Were you a strange child?: Frankly, I was the all-american kid next door. I was redheaded, played baseball and was always outside playing something. Any strangeness evolved when I was in college and got into philosophy classes and religion classes.
--What did you use to love that you no longer do? Playing baseball. I don't even play softball anymore.
--Do you have the same friends? I still keep in touch with my friends Hal & Smitty from high school and I still keep in touch with a few college buddies...but mostly my circle of friends has changed as I move into different stations in life.
--Was there anything in your past that was traumatizing?: My dad's death, obviously. My break-up with my high school girlfriend rocked me for a while, too, but not nearly as much as my dad's death. Good long-term results came from both times, though, so I don't fear the storms of life much.

Part 7: The Future
--What is your dream?: To see my kids be happy, strolling down the path that God has laid out for them (and not the one that cooks in my brain). To support my wife as she becomes one of the best photographers on the planet (she's diligently working towards that end, and I gotta say it, she's very good). Personally, to write books and get my doctorate, which might actually go hand in hand.
--Are you scared of growing old? Not at all. I'm actually just starting to figure life out some...so a few more years could only enhance that reality. I'm looking forward to it, actually.
--Do you want to get married?: Well, I already am.

Part 8: The Outdoors
--Do you prefer indoors or outdoors? Give me Manhattan, outdoors or indoors. I took this question to mean stuff like camping. I detest that kind of outdoors.
--What is your favorite season: Winter and fires in the fireplace.
--Favorite weather?: Rain. Thunderstorms in particular.
--Do you like walking in the rain?: With an umbrella.

Part 9: Food
--Are you a vegetarian?: I'm a full-blown carnivore.
--What is your favorite food? Spaghetti.
--What food makes u wanna gag?: Collard greens & squash.
--What is your favorite restaurant?: Pete's Famous Hot Dogs, Birmingham, Alabama.

Part 10: Relationships and Love

--Do you think love is the best feeling in the world?: Love is not a feeling. It's a choice. It may result in feelings, but those feelings follow the choice. But those feelings can be pretty nice.
--Do you believe in love at first sight?: Not at all. That's just attraction.

Part 11: Experiences
--What was one of your greatest experiences? Marriage is an ongoing great experience. Watching my children be born, even if I was a lousy husband during the process. My first trip to Holland. Skiing in the Rocky Mountains. Game 2 of the 1999 Stanley Cup playoffs where I got tickets. Various Auburn games (college itself for that matter). Manhattan twice. A week at Disney World. I could go on and on.
--Have you ever done drugs? Never even tried one. Mostly out of paranoid fear of being arrested when I was in high school, and then once I'd formed firm moral convictions it never seemed all that interesting.
--Have you ever thought you were going to die? Only in retrospect...like when I fell off the high dive (we were closing our eyes and walking off the end and I fell off the side rather than the end, missing the concrete ledge of the pool by about 6 inches). Once a fraternity brother was chatting while he was driving and wasn't paying attention at one of those railroad crossings in rural Auburn that have no gate or warning and he leisurely went over the tracks and a train was blowing it's horn about 30 yards or so from us and he punched the gas. When my drunk uncles (we were 10 or 11 and didn't know they were drunk, and why our moms let this happen I have no idea) would pull us on inner tubes behind the ski boat brought some pretty scary moments as they TRIED to cause magnificent crashes to amuse themselves. Pretty much anytime one of my college friends started a sentence with, "Hey, watch this." Stuff like that. But I never had a premonition.

Hmmm.

I guess the writer's block is gone, but the creative vibe still isn't there.