Nerdy Confession Saturday

Oh let’s have a nerdy confessions Saturday shall we. This whole spilling of a part of my nerdy little heart may actually be because I was listening to one of my favorite podcasts today, Nerdette. Oh how I love this podcast in all it’s nerdy glory. And it got me to thinkin’. What do I do that is nerdy.

I am sure that the progeny have a LONG list of the things that I do that they term “nerdy”. I revel in my nerdiness.

I will tell you one thing that is really nerdy about me. And slightly childish, or so I thought, until the conversation with the postal clerk yesterday. More on that in a bit. I do this thing as a form of stress relief. And it is something that I have loved to do my entire life. No, really, for as long as I can remember.

I color.

STOP LAUGHING!!!

I have distinct memories of sitting with a piece of paper and colored pencils and markers and just drawing intricate scribbles that I would then spend hours coloring. It was an intensely happy thing for me to do. It must have been because the memory is clear and sharp in my mind and I couldn’t have been more than 7 or 8 years old. When the progeny were growing up I think I was pretty much always up for a session of coloring. What better way to get that happy colory feeling than sucking the children into my obsession. No one would know that I actually LOVED the activity with intensity.

And then the progeny grew up. And for a boat load of years I didn’t color anything, not even my hair.

I would get a small coloring fix here and there when hanging out with my boyfriend. But a 2 year old doesn’t really want to sit all that long and color intricately. And even if he does sit for a bit what he REALLY wants to do is to color MY picture….and not in a nice and neat and concise way, thereby causing me great anxiety and sort of in the end producing the opposite effect of why I colored in the first place.

But a while back, on one of the blogs that I read, Zarzuela talked about how she has been coloring mandelas. And she showed a picture…..

And I knew I had to color one. It was an overwhelming urge that could not be stopped no matter what the humiliation factor might be. I printed one, I dug out my colored pencils and I went to town. Instant calm and stress relief. But I have been coloring in secret, at odd times when I needed some stress relief and calm but when no one would see me. We all know that I knit for stress relief and so I don’t kill, but no one knew that I also colored.

And then I had a conversation yesterday with the postal clerk. And we were chatting, me telling her that the puffy package actually contained hand knit socks that I was sending someone. And I told her what I always tell people, that I knit so I don’t kill, which she thought was hilarious. And then she leaned over the counter and in a conspiratorial tone she said, “Do you know what I do for some stress relief?

Insert weird Theremin music here.

I was afraid to say, “What?” but I did.

She leaned a little closer and said, “I color!”

And I joyfully said, “So do I!!”

Oh my gosh I love coloring.

And now it is all out and I can color in the open. I feel so much lighter.

I raise my fist full of markers in defiance and declare to the world that……..

I COLOR!!!