French's Book of Questions; My Answers Revealed

French just recently published a post on her blog about a book she has called The Book of Questions.  She posed some of the questions from the book on her blog, but she didn't post her own answers, nor did she request that any of us share our answers either.  She just thought it would be interesting and make us think a bit.

Well, it did make me think, so I took it one step further and decided to blog about my answers to these questions.  So if you're interested, read on!

Do you believe in ghosts or evil spirits? Would you be willing to spend one night alone in a remote house that is supposedly haunted?
I absolutely believe in the paranormal, I always have.  I've only had one experience with it myself, and that was back when I was about 17 years old.  My sister Jill, had a friend staying the night and they were in her room, doing whatever, and I was laying in bed, trying to fall asleep. All of a sudden the bed started shaking!  It didn't last long, but it did freak me out, as I was sleeping on the bed that my mother's little sister had DIED on, of a drug overdose.  I ran like a bat out of hell into Jill's room, and as I was telling her and her friend what happened, Jill's fan went on by itself and then our dog started howling.  Freaky deaky shit, this was!  Would I stay in a purportedly  haunted house by MYSELF?  No way, but give me one of the ghost hunters from TAPS and I'd do it in a second.

If you were to die tonight with no opportunity to communicate with anyone, what would you most regret not having told someone? Why haven't you told them?

I would probably die regretting not telling Jill often enough how much I love her.  I say it once in a while, and I know she KNOWS how much I love her, but I don't come out and say it nearly enough.  I guess the reason why I don't say it to her very often, is because we weren't brought up in a lovey-dovey home where sweet words or embraces were exchanged often.  Again, we knew we were loved, but in our family we knew it from the way we were yelled at, or how mom just missed my head with that melamine bowl that came flying across the room at me.  LOL


You discover your wonderful one year old child is, because of a mix-up at the hospital not yours. Would you want to exchange the child to correct the mistake?
Oh my goodness, have any of you thought about this?  It's a horrible scenario to even contemplate.  But I think maybe I would have to "exchange" the child for mine and my husband's own flesh and blood.  It's really hard to answer this one, because I don't think you can honestly say one way or the other how you'd feel in this situation unless you were living it.

If you were able to live to the age of 90 and retain either the body or the mind of a 30 year old for the last 60 years of your life, which one would you want?

Well, there are many elderly people out there who still have incredibly sharp minds, but I've never seen one with a 30-year-old's body, so I would have to say I'd take the body, and just hope my mind was sharp enough to enjoy it.  Of course, if I could really choose, I would pick to have someone ELSE's body at 30, not my own... Say, Buffie's or French's.  Yep, now those are bodies you'd wanna live till 90 with.


If you could use a voodoo doll to hurt anyone without being discovered would you?

Yikes, voodoo is kinda satanic, isn't it?  I don't think I could go there.  It might be fun in a Gilligan's Island sort of way, just a few pokes and jabs to the bottom of the feet or the sensitive area under your biceps, but truly hurting someone isn't my thing.

Would you be willing to murder an innocent person if it meant there would be no hunger left in the world?
*I* could never do it personally; take a life, that is, but I could almost understand it if someone did this.  Sacrifice one to save millions.  It's intriguing to think about.  But why couldn't the question be, "Would you be willing to murder a MURDERER if it meant there would be no hunger left in the world?"  That would be much easier to swallow.

If God appeared to you in a series of vivid dreams and told you to leave everything behind, travel alone to the Red Sea and become a fisherman, what would you do? What if you were told to sacrifice your child?

If I had vivid dreams of God speaking to me, I'd probably make an emergency appointment with my shrink.  Why would God waste his time on me?  I've never caught a fish in my life.  And I don't believe God would ever ask me or anyone else to sacrifice their child either.


What is your most treasured memory?

You're probably expecting me to say the birth of my children, right?  Well, I can't say that because it wouldn't be true.  The birth of Mikayla was a terribly traumatic one for me because the pain was so intense and I was still terrified of being a Mom.  This may sound terrible, but it took me a full two weeks before I could really say I'd fallen in love with her.  Before that it was all misery and depression.  Madison's birth could have been my most treasured memory if 1), the doctor had actually been in the room to catch her, 2) she was breathing when she came out, 3) that she didn't have seizures when she did start breathing.  Having your newborn whisked away to NICU is not a fond memory to have.

It's really so hard to pinpoint one memory that's just the bestest ever, ya know?  One memory does keep flitting back into my head though.  Jimmy and I were just 19 and we took a trip to Aruba together, where, yippee, drinking was legal at 18!  One night, a bit tipsy on rum drinks, I remember us dancing around and just having fun on the beach while a big party went on around the pool.  Come to think of it, I have LOTS of great memories.  Grandma serving us a huge Christmas Eve dinner of 7 fishes, Dad walking me down the aisle, I could go on and on.  Most of my great memories seem to revolve around food and family though.  Isn't that true of most people?


Do your close friends tend to be older or younger than you?

I'd have to say older.  It's not like I set out to choose older friends, it's just that people I've grown to love happen to be older than me.


Your house that contains everything you own, catches fire; after saving your loved ones and pets you have time to save just one more thing what would it be and why?

Are you kidding me?  This damn laptop, for sure!  And why?  How the heck could I stay in touch with all my blogger homies and my email loops if I didn't?  It'd be a travesty!  


Someone very close to you is in pain, paralyzed, and will die within a month. He begs you to give him poison so that he can die. Would you? What if it were your father!

Egads!  I hate this question, but I think I may "help" it along if I could.  But would I have to go to jail?  That would make a big difference, wouldn't it?  Wasn't there a Golden Girls episode that dealt with this issue?

If you could choose the manner of your death would you? What would it be?

I think I'd have to say yes, in my sleep, please.

If you could change anything about the way you were raised, what would it be?

I guess I wish that my dad had been more involved in our lives when we were younger.  It seemed like all he did was work, and when he wasn't working he didn't want to spend time with us kids.  Maybe that's true, maybe it's not... I'll never know for sure.  I think it would have been nice if our family was more affectionate and less LOUD too.  But wait.  If I change the way I was raised, then I'm changing who I am now, and the relationships all of us have together now.  So no, maybe I don't want to change my childhood.  Hmmm.

Would it disturb you much if, upon your death, your body were simply thrown into the woods and left to rot? Why?

Hell yes it would!  Look, I was squished through a hole the size of a lemon to get into this world. Imagine the trauma of that!  Can't you find a better way to take me out?  I don't know, say, bury me in a mountain of rose petals or something?

Do you feel you have much impact on the lives of people you come into contact with? Can you think of someone who, over a short period of time, significantly influenced your life?

I think I do make an impact on people I meet, but it's usually they love me or they hate me. Not much in between.  I don't know if I would say that this person "influenced" me.  More that she helps open my eyes every once in a while to what is truly important in life.  She lives her life with her heart on her sleeve and with such vitality that it's hard not to be affected.  Who is this? It's Dot, from Picket's Place.  She'll probably be stunned to read that because it's not like we're best friends, we don't email each other, etc.  But there you have it, in any case!

So, those were the intriguing questions that French posed for us today.  I don't know if any of my answers we interesting to you, but it was kind of fun to actually sit and contemplate each one before answering.

Until next time, Justine :o )