Judy P's Tickle Trunk

….or 20 questions and then some.

What did you like to do when you were alone when you were ten or eleven years old? Play air guitar? Dance in front of the mirror? Lip sync? My favourite solitary activity was pretending I was being interviewed. Sometimes I would pretend I was a singer, other times an actress, often just a random rich and famous person. So it is no stretch of the imagination for me to figure out why I loved the Proust questionnaire when I discovered it as an adult. I revisited it last week and was inspired to create my own Tickle Trunk Questionnaire.

So picture yourself in Milton, sitting in a rocker with your feet on the gliding footstool. You have your favourite beverage in hand and some nibblies on the side table. (Guacamole and wheat thins for me please) There is a comical cat staring into the fire in the open Rumford fireplace. I am un-reclined in Lance’s recliner. Prepare to be interviewed if you will.

I hope to make this a regular feature so heads up, you may get a solicitation. If you wish to be presented just email me your answers. Anonymous? No sweat – just give some idea of how you would like to be presented. So here goes. My first candidate is, drum roll please, Ta-dum-ta-dum, ME!!

Now being a Gemini who has great difficulty making decisions, I could give a dozen different responses depending on the day, so I made an effort to limit myself to just two for most of them. So just let me take a long sip of my sparkling berry-flavoured wine-like beverage (Oh ye sisters with class, unite) and pick up my pen:

1. What is your first memory?

a. In our kitchen in Pilley’s Island, my Uncle Edwin lifting me up over his head to put me on the radio shelf. b. Standing in the woodbox in Grammy Parsons’ kitchen in Pilley’s Island, wailing because Mom and Dad were leaving me there to go out for the evening.

2.What is your favourite flavour?

a. lime with coconut b. strawberry-rhubarb.

3. If you could have pursued another profession other than the one you are in, what would it be?

a. an officer in the Coast Guard b. forensic anthropologist. (I recently did an online aptitude test and it told me I was best suited to be a funeral director or a forest ranger.)

4.Which talent would you most like to have?

a. play finger-picking guitar b. be able to dance

5.What quality do you most admire in a man? A woman? A child?

a. creativity b. a sense of humour for all three.

6. Who was your favourite Sesame Street character?

a. Grover b. Kermit but only when he was doing his news reporter character and interviewing characters from nursery rhymes.

7. Who is your favourite writer?

Had a lot of trouble narrowing this down. In no particular order: Tom Robbins, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, VS Naipaul, William Faulkner, Frank McCourt and many more.

8. What movie have you watched the most times?

a. Oh Brother Where Art Thou b. Freaky Friday (the newer one)

9. What would be your ideal Sunday afternoon relaxation?

a. curled up in a papasan chair next to a wood fire, knitting and listening to my husband play the country blues. b. Sunday brunch with friends at Wayne McNiven’s with quiche and spinach salad and the music from Cabaret

10. What is your favourite word?

a. magnanimous b. philanthropy

11. If you had to choose a pen name what would it be?

a. Gail Beaumont b. Betty Benson

12. If you had to choose a porn name what would it be?

a. Dolly Parsons b. Jiggles

13. What would you do on an ideal date?

a. Row out the bay with a picnic. Beachcomb. Row back as the sun is setting opposite a rising moon. b. lunch at an art gallery

14. What famous piece of art would you most like to own?

a. the marble bust of Alexandre Brongniart by Jean-Antoine Houdon b. Red Poppy by Georgia O’Keeffee

15. What do you consider the greatest invention of your lifetime?

a. fibre-optics b. the horseless buggy. Wait, I’m not that old!

16. Where do you feel most at home?

a. on the open ocean b. on the stage

17. If you could invent something, what would it be?

a. a new religion b. a breathalyzer attached to the send button on a phone or computer

18. If you could ask the queen one question, what would it be?

a. Are we related? b. What is your favourite hobby?

19. What song defines your life?

a. I Did it My Way b. Je ne Regrette Rien

20.What is your mother’s best trait? Your father’s?

Mother – loyalty, Father – courage.

So….who’s next?

© Judy Parsons 2015