grown-ups

I used to believe…

When I was little, I took language very literally. When I would hear about someone being "fired", I thought that meant their boss came out with a flamethrower and set them on fire.

I used to believe…

When I was little I used to think you got younger instead of older. So I used to say when I was older etc... I also thought I was very old and used to cry because I thought I was going to die soon.

I used to believe…

whe i was 5 my mother said if i did't behave she would ship me over to a new familly, for about 3yrs or so i really thought you could send kids by UPS i was afraid of the man w/ the brown outfit??

I was awake one night when I heard my parents lecturing my older sister and were telling her that they were going to ground her. I took this as meaning they were going to kill her (I guess maybe putting her underground?) and began sobbing.

I uses to believe that when you turned 20 you suddenly became boring and couldn't do anything silly any more. I finally discovered otherwise when my cousin Chris told me he was 24 and he had played lego, climbed up trees and sucked on my other cousins dummy as a joke. So I then decided that he was still a kid and some people just remained babies forever.... That really scared me as I still wet the bed.

I used to be afraid that if I did something bad and blamed it on someone else, my mother would read my thoughts and punish me. Whenever I would blame my older brother for something (eating the last of the cookies, etc.), I would be frightened for weeks that mom would read my thoughts and come punish me.

I used to believe…

When I was about 4 I believed that when I grew up I would turn into a boy and become batman.
I also walked around with a plastic batman mask until it literally fell apart.

I used to believe…

As a child I saw how much energy grownups put into kissing and love type stuff. It seemed like a real waste of time, yet I knew one day I would want to spend time and energy the same way, 'cause it happened to everyone. I dreaded that.

Related to this, I saw how much people change mentally as they got older, and since the person I was at that moment would morph into someone completely different, who I was would essentially die to be replaced by this different creature. I still feel this way.

I used to believe…

When I was 5 or 6 and younger my parents would sometimes say things that started with "when you grow up. . . " I would listen politely to this assumption, but of course I knew that I had ALWAYS been a little kid and would naturally stay that way. And those stories about when they were kids? Made up completely.

I used to believe that my mother (who is 56) had grown up with Laura Ingalls Wilder. I was a big fan of the books and was excited to tell all my friends that my mom knew Laura, Pa, Mary, and Almanzo. They all thought this was very cool.

I used to believe that women got pregnant if they didn't get married soon enough. Like if a single pregnant girl was on TV, and I asked my mom how she was having a baby without a husband, my mom would say, "Oh she messed around before she got married." I thought that meant she took her sweet time getting to the alter.

I used to believe…

for some weird reason, whe i was a kid i thought that you could only marry a person that was your age. not younger or older. so, at the time the only male i knew that was my age was my cousin. i told him my belief so we deicded we would marry each other. we told our parents and they just laughed..

thankfully i stopped beliveing that a bout a year later..lol

I used to believe…

When I was little my dad had a funny sign in his workshop that said "Warning: BARE AREA cover your eyes". I thought it really meant BEARS were in the area and I was terrified to death to go in his workshop for fear the bears would eat me.

I used to believe that 'call girl' was another word for a female telephone operator. It used to come up in episodes of 'Columbo' that such-and such, a call girl, was murdered on....

I grew up in Ireland, I had a catholic upbringing and regularly visited the church which was nearby. As a little girl it was a big thrill to stand at the back of the church while a wedding was in progress, when the bride and groom left the altar to go to the sacristy behind the altar I always though that they were going in there to get the "equipment" for making babies...in actual fact they went in there to sign the registry.
It made perfect sense to me at the time.....

I used to believe that "Tallest Person in the World" was a job and that it paid good money. When I was in elementary school I always tried to be the tallest and when someone beat me, I was heartbroken.