What I learned from TeenBeat....

When I was about 22 or so I went to my parent's home to help them pack up all of their belongings from our family home and prepare for it to be moved to their city of choice for retirement. I have a sneaky suspicion that the invite was also a ruse to make sure that I removed all of my high school memorabilia, as it was packed up in a box marked, "TAKE THIS TO YOUR OWN HOME!" I don't know WHY they didn't want to store my homecoming mums or Letterman jacket, but alas they didn't and I had to decide what to do with it.

I thought I better go through the box and purge a little before I hauled it home. So I tore into the time warp from the early nineties and meandered down memory lane. Somewhere in between my withered corsage from my first date and a MASH game with a favorable outcome, I found an old TeenBeat magazine.

On the cover, the one and only Scott Baio!

The cover also teased of a personality test inside. Well, since there was packing to do, my sister and I decided to take the test.

It was a test that would resonate with me (what does that say about my life - TeenBeat resonated with me - you would be hard pressed to find that sentence anywhere else in the world!) There were 4 possible outcomes all in the form of shapes. Your personality would either represent a squiggle, a square, a line, or a triangle.

My sister went first and she was a line (not much of a shocker there!) My sister is such a point A to point B person. She is always on the ball and very efficient at whatever it is that needs to be done. She will arrive at her destination early, looking like a million bucks, and very prepared! Yep, I'm jealous!

I went second; I avoided the triangle, which I believe was reserved for the truly weird (think Trekies) and the rectangle which was for the most concrete thinkers (this was heavy stuff - I mean it was TeenBeat). However, I landed on the squiggle.

Hmmm....let me see what does that mean? You will arrive at your destination in life at your own speed, on your own terms, and with many side trips! I wasn't too fond of that - nope - not one little bit! I wanted to be a line! I wanted to be efficient and early and....not gonna happen (especially the early part).

So fast forward 10 or so years and I look at my life and I think about that test and it is so true. I'm a squiggle. I'm pointed in the same direction as my line counterparts, but it will take me longer to get there because there are so many scenic side trips to interest me. Every time I have tried to be a line I just felt like an impersonator. I'm learning to accept that and embrace it and realize it is fun but quirky. (My stomach is lurching b/c I'm waxing poetic about TeenBeat!)

Some "lines" that I have met in my life have a hard time with the "squiggle". The looks of, "are you just a little different" don't escape me, because I know it well, it is the same look I give the "Triangle Trekies."