I've Been Tagged: 7 Random Things

Thanks to Beth and Jennifer, I've been tagged.

I'm not going to lie, I find this a bit challenging, because I feel like I assail you with random things about Cath all the time, particularly in my stream of consciousness ramblings, but here goes:

I was born in a tiny town called Ely, Nevada. Back in the day, as a young band director, my dad got a job teaching at White Pine High School. I was born the following December. We lived there until I was 2, we moved back home to be near family, and I've lived in Utah ever since. Does 42 years in Utah make me native? I sure feel like one.

Mark calls me Fern. He has never really called me Catherine, he only occasionally calls me Cath (and that's just lately), and he started out calling me Katie. Which morphed to Katie-did. Cute. Loved it. But, my ex-husband used to also call me Katie, so it didn't sit entirely right with me. But then my niece, Olivia, came along. She couldn't say my name, so she would call me Aunt Caffern. One day, Mark was teasing me, calling me, "Caf-fern, Caf-fern," with the emphasis on "fern." Next thing I knew he was calling me just "Fern" all the time. For Valentine's Day the next year, he bought me a Boston fern and named it Fern's Fern. To him, I am Fern and I love it right down to my toes. Makes sense. Mark's mom's name is Barbara. But his step-dad calls her Sam.

I am closely related to prominent Mormon pioneers. Orson Pratt is my great-something grandfather which also means that Parley P. was my great-soemthing uncle. Erastus Bingham of Bingham Canyon fame is my great-something grandfather as well (his house is preserved in Pioneer Village at Lagoon). Anson Call, the settler of Bountiful is another grandfather, and I am related by marriage to Loren Farr, the first mayor of Ogden. Which also means that I wouldn't be here at all if it hadn't been for polygamy.

In my former life I was a musician. I started playing the violin when I was 3, piano when I was 5, and the clarinet when I was 10. I performed an entire piano recital with just two other girls when I was in the 6th grade. I was in the Golden Spike Orchestra, the Lagoon Show Band, the Ute Marching Band, and I was on TV as a Sterling Scholar for Music when I was a senior in high school. As a single mom who needed to bring in more income, I had 17 private clarinet students.

I am missing my two top incisors. I had one of the baby teeth, but none of the permanent teeth. Which is good, because when my wisdom teeth came in, I totally had room. Even luckier, I don't have any wisdom teeth on the bottom, so I never had to have them out. I'm good with any occasion in which I don't have to go under the knife.

I hate to go to the movies. After spending 10 years as a middle school teacher and having to babysit students that are not mine in school assemblies, I have no tolerance whatsoever for texters and their lights that shine in my face, cell phones that ring at the most tender point of the movie, incessant talkers, parents who cannot manage to leave their too-young children at home with a babysitter, and old wives who translate for their older husbands with hearing loss, and the generally rude public with which I must mingle. Give me my HDTV with surround-sound and the option of stopping the movie for popcorn and potty breaks and I'm one happy camper.

I skipped first grade. The word they used was "precocious." I have no idea what skills you need to demonstrate for the powers that be to determine that I was ready for second grade. What I do know is that what I apparently exhibited in intellectual maturity, I definitely lacked in emotional and physical maturity including a rather traumatic experience in 7th grade gym when I was the only girl who didn't have breasts and my mother wouldn't get me a bra until I grew some.

Ready to embrace the randomness? Tag, you're it!

Nicole

Beccah

Andree'

Sharyn

Dawn

Marilyn

Becky

Comments

[Sharyn]

I'm thinking. I've come up with two so far....must think more.

[Barbara Spencer]

I never heard the "fern" story before, always wondered where it came from, makes a better memory than just "Sam".???

[Rachel Greig]

So funny and interesting to read!! I had four teeth taken out before I had braces put on when I was 12, and now I have plenty of room for wisdom teeth! They all came through with no problems.

[Jennifer Hansen]

Too funny ! I have the same teeth issues pretty much, except I didn't ever get wisdom teeth, so I have two false teeth instead to cover for the missing ones. I spent alot of time at the dentist as a child.....

[Sharyn]

done. ;)