In 100 Words or Less...

I cannot be contained in 100 words. Oy.

But I have to submit a bio of myself to the Vancouver Mom peeps so that they can "profile" me and let the public decide, which is equal parts humiliating (think gym class and being picked last) and exciting (vote for me!). I'm resigned to coming in last, because (as I've learned from my many years in Phys. Ed.), if you set your bar low enough, you will only be pleasantly surprised.

This is tricky work. First of all, there's that fine balance that I have to figure out: you know, between being serious and professional, and being a wee bit hyperbolic (which Hubbs and I are both prone to). Then there's the line between wanting to be a bit self-deprecating, and not wanting to come across as an ass who's not taking this nomination seriously.

I am so many things, though. And yet I'm nothing special, either. What makes me worth reading?

Which details do I include? I'm a grieving daughter, a mostly-loving wife, a generous employer, and a nightmare to incompetent service providers. I'm a tired mommy, but a fulfilled one. I'm a Jesus-loving Christ-following believer, but I don't identify with a lot of the conservative Christians out there who subscribe to the Fox News-brand of politics and world views. I'm funny, except when I'm not; sometimes I'm funny when I'm trying not to be, and sometimes my best attempts at humour are majorly lame fails. I'm opinionated and stubborn in my convictions, but I'm not one to ostracize others based on opposing ideologies. I like to be kind of crunchy in my parenting, but I'm a walking contradiction because I also buy stuff (like super monster bubble solution and fancy facial products) that probably contain 3,264 bad chemicals. I like authentic people, and I don't like many of the "schticks" that people use on their blogs or other social media to try to carve themselves a different identity than the one that comes natural to them. I love meat, and I hate veggies (except for salads). 

It's hard work narrowing it all down to 100 words, especially for a loquacious person like me. I didn't give myself that descriptor, remember? It was used to describe me by a former boss. And wordiness definitely comes naturally to me; I was always the student who exceeded word counts by more than half, and then had to fudge margins, line spacing and font sizes to try to keep from having to hack off bits of my writing. I am the opposite of succinct.

So I've figured out a happy medium to this whole "write your bio" thing - I'll submit a "teaser trailer" that is within the allotted word count (okay, it's 114 words, but close enough). Then I'll post the rest of who I am on this here blog, and if you are a new reader, you can piece the rest of the picture together based on my posts (like this one! See what I did there? So subtle, so clever. So me. LOL).

Win - win.