Happy August Lists

 
I have always enjoyed lists, whether I am making them myself or reading the list others create and post.  I came across a web site recently that has nothing but lists of questions to answer - Nirvana! http://heckyeahtumblrchallenges.tumblr.com/newdirectory

 I think most of them are geared to the, getting to know you category.  I spent several  hours minutes wandering through all these lists.

I think I am going to use August, a personal favourite month, to set myself 31 questions to answer; one a day.  Although the list has only 30 questions and August has 31 days,  I will create and throw in a joker question of my own.   This is the list I am going to use:

So being that this is August 1st, here's question one answered:

1) Introduce yourself:

My birth was registered exactly two weeks after my actual birth.  Some parts of this story are family lore & cannot  be confirmed with the original players, some parts I know are fact as I was part of the story’s events. Two weeks after the birth is the longest it took my parents to register any of their children.  I am one of 12 of my parents children. (Much more about this on other days).  I was baptized within the church at the age of 2 ½ years of age along side of my 2 month old brother. Other than myself, all of the children were baptized as newborn infants.  My baptismal papers said my name was Mary-Lou.  Had I been born a boy, I was told I would have been called Mark.    

I had never seen a copy of my birth certificate but the year I was researching family history,  I requested to see my first official government card.  I was shocked; no this cannot be, there must be a mistake.  My Mother was laughing as she saw my shock & bewilderment. Turns out I was registered with a different name other than what was on my church & school registration papers.  My Mother claimed that she originally knew nothing of these three names until after the official registration & that's why she had never shown me my birth certificate before. I promptly called my father, who claimed it was with my Mother’s doing.  Both of them had connection to all three of these names, so both could have been responsible.  I was also the only child to receive three names.  Being young & emotional, I questioned who was I really, what other lies could there be?   I took the matter into my own hands, I visited the birth & deaths office, confirmed the signature on the registered forms; as I thought,  my father's.  Within my family this story is laughable.  It is still not a joke to me but I have certainly soften towards the tale as I now know I am not the name of my birth certificate.  I taken the third name & incorporated into my (published) writing name, so I guess the tale ends with the thought … a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.

Photos of tea cups & flowers from the Internet