Newman Was Right!

Introduction (or, Here's What's Gonna Happen)

I am going to do something I do not usually do: I am going to organize my thoughts. I know: it scares me too. But this was a pretty heavy reading, and it struck me in a few too many places just to smash it all together and attempt to simply use paragraph transitions (which I am not very good at anyway) to divide all of my ideas. If you read no further (which I don't blame you because I know you are busy children) know this: Newman, however thick his writing may be to read, knew what he was talking about.

Why, might you ask, am I so sure that Newman's idea that “knowledge... is desirable, though nothing come of it” (pg 167) is so enlightened?

Sue Monk Kidd put it perfectly in The Secret Life of Bees , saying “There is nothing perfect. There is only life.” Guess what? Life is complicated. And we can plan and plan for one thing our entire lives, and study like never before and be SO SURE that it's all going to work out and then WHOOSH, before you know it you realize that everything you thought was “the right thing” to know is useless and you're up a certain creek without a paddle.

http://idleminutes.com/wp-content/uploads/waiting_for_a_row.jpg

And yeah, that is going to not be the funnest thing you have ever experienced. However, at least with a liberal education you'll be well rounded enough that even if you lose your paddle, or the boat turns over, or some other horrible thing happens to you, you'll have some kind of a backup plan. Even if you have to swim, at least you'll still be headed somewhere.

Newman's Garden (or, An Array of Deliciousness)

“May I suggest that you all read? And often. Believe me, it's nice to have something to talk about other than the weather and the Queen's health. Your mind is not a cage. It is a garden. And it requires cultivating.” (A Great and Terrible Beauty, pg 128)

Let's say, in light of the wonderful quote at the beginning of this section, that our minds really are Gardens. And let's say, just because if we don't say it this metaphor won't make any sense, that this garden is the only thing that we have to live off of. We can't go to the grocery store and buy bananas: we have to pick them off our banana tree.

How are we going to make sure we don't starve? Or become malnutritioned? We're going to have to start planting a bunch of stuff, that's how. And we're going to have to take care of our baby vegetables and fruits, and make sure they grow big and strong and provide us with something delicious.

Newman had a pretty healthy Garden. I can tell: he had a Garden he could live off of. He didn't just plant Carrots. Carrots are only good for making carrot cake, which, granted, is absolutely DELCIOUS, but can get old after awhile. No, Newman had LOTS of different things in his Garden. Probably some Onions, some Cabbage, some Tomatoes... you name it, Newman had it. And if he didn't have it? He was trying to get it. Busy kid, that Newman. But here's the thing: in the end, he realized that all of these different vegetables were “connected together” (Idea of a University, pg 165), and that since they were connected, they could make something delicious: AN ENTIRE MEAL!

See how appealing this diverse garden is? You could definitely make a meal out of the stuff growing here!

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3045/2706395442_45422dac90.jpg?v=0

Do you get it? If our minds are a Garden, and if the only mind that we can reliably have access to (unless you're a psychic in which case I am very impressed) is our own, then we need to make sure that our mind is filled with a variety of different kinds of knowledge that will be useful in a variety of different circumstances. More important than this, however, is the fact that, as Newman professes, “all branches of knowledge are connected together” (pg 165). You need ALL of those different types of vegetables to make an entire meal, and you need all those different disciplines of knowledge to function at your full capacity in the world.

I think the doctor article is a great example of this. Gail Morrison points out that “It doesn't make you a better doctor to know how fast a mass falls from a tree” (173H). Yeah, the hard science majors are geniuses: WE GET IT. YOU ARE AMAZING AT SCIENCE. But it's the Science and History and Music and whatever else majors that make the best doctors because they have the most well rounded knowledge base and are better prepared to deal with the variety of problems that present themselves in the medical field.

I can attest to this. I had this dentist once who like... ripped out my tooth without warning me. As in, I was 8 years old, sitting quietly in the dentist chair, minding my own business, and he came over and was like “Oh, this one looks loose” and BAM there goes my tooth.

Look. I get that the tooth needed to come out sometime, OK? And it's great that he was a capable dentist who was able to recognize that. BRAVO! But, really, did he have to rip it out like that? Maybe, if my dentist had taken some history classes in college, he would have realized that people don't like it when things are taken from them without their permission. Ever heard of the American Revolution? The colonies weren't exactly thrilled that the British government was taking their money through taxes without them having any say in it, were they? And then they revolted and now there is a country where the colonies used to be.

I guess you could say I did something similar to the colonies. I threw up on Dr. N (not on purpose, OBVIOUSLY, but the yanking of the tooth apparently started some kind of a chain reaction...) and got a new dentist.

The red guy is Dr. Nelson, but no worries! I got him in the end.http://lehrman.isi.org/media/images/cache/George_Washington_in_the_American_Revolution.jpg/360px-George_Washington_in_the_American_Revolution.jpg

He could have avoided a lot of trouble if he'd had a more liberal education, don't you think?

The How to Guide to Cultivating Your Garden (or, Plan 2 is AWESOME)

Newman says the a University is THE PLACE to figure out how to cultivate your Garden. But he describes a university as something that offers you a specific thing: an education, which “implies an action upon our mental nature and the formation of a character”.

I have my doubts that any college can live up to Newman's words. I think whether the university you go to is actually Newman's University almost depends more on the who you are then the university itself. I mean, if you're not trying to cultivate you're garden, having the tools to do so isn't going to make it any healthier. But the thing about Plan 2, and UT in general, is that at least they are actually trying to be close to Newman's University. Dean Parlin said that Plan 2 stresses “liberal culture rather than vocational training”. In this place, in this program. I know that people are hoping that I take the tools they are giving me and don't just go out and become an Employed Person. They want me to cultivate my garden, and they hope that through this they can “transform [my] life for the benefit of society” (pg 183A). They want me to "[connect] information to the 'real world'" (pg 184).

Purpose in Education (or, MY PURPOSE???????)

“Purpose is:

Who you touch

How you change the world

The good you leave behind.” (A Heart Divided)

Purpose is GREAT. Or it would be great if I could figure out what the heck my purpose is. I'm 19, and even though all these random adult people KEEP FREAKING ASKING ME, I have no idea. What am I supposed to do here? And how am I supposed to know how to do it?

What I like about Newman is that he's not all about the specific purpose. What he wants us to do is PREPARE for our purpose through “Universal Knowledge” and through the cultivation of our Garden, which we can learn how to do at his University.

I like that idea. And I'm ready for that idea, you know? I'm ready to prepare for my purpose.

Bring it on :)

Bring on the rest of my pilgrimage! (as represented by this shell)

http://www.freeclipartnow.com/d/7151-1/scallop-shell.jpg

Hammer

://drukhier.nl/demo/components/com_virtuemart/shop_image/product/Hammer_4926f26d96402.jpg

Pop quiz, kiddoes! As an ESFJ², I am most likely to be found:

A. In a soup kitchen, feeding small children while simultaneously having mini heart attacks over the lack of sanitary conscientiousness among children. (“ESFJ's are... not paranoid, but VERY cautious”³).

B. Partying like it's 1999 (or 2000, or 2001, or 2002... I'm an extrovert.)

C. Watching Bambi and crying because Walt Disney just HAD to kill off Bambi's mother and I am “easily affected emotionally”⁴, aka pathetically weepy.

I do tend to get very emotional in movies, probably owing to my ESFJ personality. The first time I saw Bambi at age 6, I had to leave the room and regroup for a bit after his mother died. However, I did not grow out of my emotional tendencies. When I as 13 I had to leave the room when ET was shown lying in a ditch, and this sort of thing will most likely continue to happen to me.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Bambi.jpg

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_rZHry3yxLM/SFce4rDiicI/AAAAAAAACfo/HEiosavWwrI/s400/et3.jpg

D. Standing, miserable, wet, and cold, on the track, at 10 o'clock on a Friday night while a torrent of drizzling rain stretches my mouth down, down, down until I'm frowning like Adele's imitation of Mr. Rochester in the 1940's version of Jane Eyre.

Though I was unable to find a photograph of Adele, the frown on this child's face is very representative of my frown.

http://willbecontinued.files.wordpress.com/2006/08/frown-front.jpg

Yeah... I'm not thrilled about this whole track meet thing. But, you know, I'm an ESFJ! I “forego what personal dilemmas [I] may face to help carry on the [team] goals!”⁵. You know what though? Coach was just RUDE to me, I'm telling you⁶. He should be “[encouraging me and making me feel] safe”⁷. Yeah, when you look up safe in the dictionary? It doesn't include coaches springing on you that you're running the mile 30 minutes before the event⁸. I don't feel safe at all. In fact, I am slightly close to losing my mind with fear⁹.

Stupid Kelly Anderson¹⁰. She just HAD to be an overachiever and try high jump, and then she HAD to go and sprain her ankle, and then she HAD to go and tell Coach she wasn't running the mile, and she HAD to suggest that, since I only run the 800, I should take her place. Thanks a lot, Kelly. I'll remember this next time you ask me to help you with your Spanish homework¹¹. Screw foregoing personal dilemmas. My hands are blue. THIS IS UNACCEPTABLE.

I jump up and down, trying to keep warm so when the race starts I'm not stiff. Why, I don't know, since everyone else on the team has retreated back to the bus¹², so I could soulja boy¹³ my way around the track and no one would ever know except Coach, who obviously has no concern for my health and therefore does not deserve effort. Apparently the personal dilemmas of my teammates were not great enough to overpower their need for warmth. I, on the other hand, because of my LOVELY personality, am trying to remember what it felt like when I didn't have to look at my fingers to make sure they were still attached to my body¹⁴.

This is part of the soulja dance I considered doing around the track. However, I would probably have never actually done this, because I'm actually pretty sensitive to how other people think of me, as my ESFJ personality hints at. This would have been just a little too embarrassing.

http://img.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2007/11_02/souljadance2_468x312.jpg

Oh, GREAT. They're lining us up. Awesome. I'm really living the dream here, aren't I? Some teenagers would want to, oh, I don't know, be with friends on a Friday night. Not me. Fridays are for freezing!

The starter is so grotesquely bundled all I can see is the tip of his nose. I cannot take this guy seriously. I mean, he's dressed like the abominable snowman. Still, I “respect the [track] chain of command”¹⁵ like the ESFJ that I am and shiver my way over to my lane, my muscles creaking and every fiber of my being yelling at me to run for the nearest forest fire and throw myself in it¹⁶. You think I sound suicidal? I'm in shorts and a sleeveless jersey in the freezing rain, OK? What I'm doing right NOW is suicidal.

The starter was wearing a jacket very similar to this abominable snowman's fur coat, although I don't remember him having such pointed teeth.

http://buttercuppunch.files.wordpress.com/2008/03/mn013_abominable_snowman.jpg

BAM!

All the intense kids take off. I, instead, yelp, take a confused step back, pray that the God will strike the abominable snowman with lightning for scaring me with the starting gun, and follow them.

*~*~*~*~*

Everyone always does the first lap too fast. I don't know if all track runners have impatient personalities, or if they just get overly excited when they see the black tar stretched out before them, but I'm about 15 meters behind by the time I finally get started, and I KNOW I wasn't standing at the starting line in confusion all that long.

“Get up there 'Costa!” bellows Coach through his thick southern accent.

I grit my teeth, push back repressed memories of evil coaches past¹⁷, and work my way “up there”.

I focus on the ostentatious pink scrunchy that adorns the ponytail of one of the runners in front of me and decide to catch up with her. This is probably not the smartest thing I've ever done, considering she's... winning. But Coach said to get “up there”, and I have just defined what “up there is”: the front.¹⁸

By the end of the first lap, I'm sweating icicles¹⁹, panting, and... in 12^th place. (As opposed to 16^th place, which is where I started. I'm moving up in the world, apparently.) Rain droplets pelt me like little ice bullets as I continue my trek and when I pass the stands that line the track a camera flashes from one of the few lone parents still braving the elements.

Well that's going to be a GREAT picture, isn't it? Thanks a lot, my budding photographer friend. I was afraid I might forget this wonderful experience of agony, but now, because you have forever preserved it in the form of that picture. I can relive it over and over again!

Now obviously this picture is from cross country, not track, but the point I have to make is the same. No one wants pictures taken of them while they are suffering. It is just not pretty. Is it any wonder I was upset by the anonymous parent photographer? I really didn't think any more of these pictures needed to be brought into existence.

Picture taken by my mother.

Pushing down the urge to jump into the stands and wrestle the camera out of the photographers hands, I instead channel my anger towards a more profitable goal, namely my pursuit of the pink scrunchy bobbing ahead of me.²⁰ The scrunchy is considerably closer then when the race started but still a good 100 meters ahead, and we're already on our third lap. I push my pace a bit, trying to close the gap between us while also desperately ignoring the fact that I have a huge cramp where my heart should be.

Ding!!!!!!!!²¹

The pink scrunchy has started her last lap, and I follow suit, 60 meters later. I'm almost done, I'm almost done, I'm ALMOST DONE, and the Earth falls out from under me and I HAMMER, my feet pounding the floor, my legs flying, my pain floating somewhere, forgotten, my eyes trained on the bobbing pink that looms ever closer, ever closer, ever closer and then there it is, I can touch it if I want to but instead, I go around it, and ay Dios mio²² were racing, and I think people are cheering but I can't tell because the wind is in my ears and I want it I want it I want it²³ and...

I'm done.

I try to catch my breathe as someone pushes a second place ribbon into my hand and then I smile, because as much as I complain about hating running, there are moments, like this, when I know that underneath my sarcasm I love it the way only an ESFJ can: with a passionate, “boiling” emotion ²⁴ that even the most terrible weather conditions can't dampen.²⁵

Word Count: 2306

1Hammer, in this story, refers to two things. The first is Yeats' quote, where he says to “hammer your thoughts into unity”. Throughout this story, I'm going to have conflicting thoughts and emotions about running, which, in the end, I'm going to have to figure out how to hammer together. The second thing referenced in this title is the moment, at the end of a race, when a runner gives everything she has left.

Quote from: Bump, Jerome. “Goals.” In E 603 Composition and Reading in World Literature Fall 2009, 15.

2In this story, I'm going to be exploring how my personality type, ESFJ, affects me, as well as in what ways it does and doesn't describe me. I will also be exploring the idea of “[hammering]... thoughts into unity” .

Quote from: Bump, 15

3Tayi, Saumya. “Typology Assessment of Instructor and Class.” In E 603 Composition and Reading in World Literature Fall 2009, Compiled by Jerome Bump, 143.

4Tayi, 143

5Tayi, Saumya. “Typology Assessment of Instructor and Class.” In E 603 Composition and Reading in World Literature Fall 2009, Compiled by Jerome Bump, 143.

6I know that I sound scandalized by Coach's treatment of me but I really just should not be surprised. This is a man who I slaved away for my entire high school existence and who still, on the last meet of my senior year, called me Laura.

7Tayi, 143

8I'm aware that most people are not as familiar with the logistics of high school track as I am, but basically 2 hours is the minimum warning time you're supposed to give someone before a race. There are a couple of reasons for this. First of all, if the runner has been eating, they can have time to digest their food. Runners need about 45 minutes to an hour to warm up, and they may, depending on how serious they are, need to come up with a strategy for the race. Granted, I “tend to leap... with little planning”, so this last time-consuming factor was not really a problem for me, but I still would have liked some down time before I needed to start warming up!

Quote from: DiTiberio, John K. and George H. Jensen. “Approaches to Writing.” In E 603 Composition and Reading in World Literature Fall 2009, Compiled by Jerome Bump, 148.

9High school track meets are nerve-wracking, but when you are asked to run an event you have not trained for, they are like something out of a horror movie. Some of the kids competing are training to be college athletes, and there you are, five minutes before the race starts, only recently informed that there are 4 laps in a mile, about to compete against them. So I think you can understand why I was terrified.

10Enter Kelly Anderson, the epitome of high school track perfection. Most people are good at one or two events: Kelly is good at EVERYTHING. This usually works in my favor, because it means that the coaches put her in a million and a half events and everyone else in just one or two. Obviously, though, in this case, since the golden girl is unable to perform her duties, it's up to someone (me) to take up the slack.

11Not sure if this needs an explanation, but I'll give the short version. Kelly fails at learning Spanish. I am quite talented at Spanish. Kelly often asks me to help her. I usually do. From this point forward, she will no longer be receiving my help because it is her fault I am enduring the torture that is the mile.

12The track is a few miles from the school, so we took a bus to get there. However, the bus, at this point, is the warmest place for miles, so my über-supportive team decided to put their warmth ahead of me and stay on the bus until the meet is over.

13Soulja' boy- A ridiculous dance and matching song that gained popularity a couple years ago. Very inappropriate song, slightly too-stupid-to-be-done-in-public dance.

14I am numb. Very, very, very numb. It is not a pleasant feeling.

15Tayi, Saumya. “Typology Assessment of Instructor and Class.” In E 603 Composition and Reading in World Literature Fall 2009, Compiled by Jerome Bump, 143.

16Not only would I be far away from the track meet which is scaring the heck out of me, I'd also be warm!

17 I had a volleyball coach once who would spend entire games yelling at us. It was third grade Town and Country. I don't know if you've ever heard of Town and Country, but it is a recreational league. As in the only people who ever come to the games are the parents of the children participating in them. As in the entire crowd cheers when one child attempts to touch the ball. As in if we ever had a real volley, where the ball was served to one side of the court and actually hit back over the net, they would probably have to call an ambulance for all the overexcited fathers in the audience.

Joe Butt says on typelogic.com that ESFJ's are “easily wounded”, so maybe that's why I used to get so upset when the coach would yell at me during those games, but regardless, I think there's a way to be a tough coach without spending entire games picking apart the self esteem of your players. Might I remind you that my team and I were NINE YEARS OLD! I bet half of us end up on Oprah, exploring the pains of our 3rd volleyball experiences under the miraculous self-esteem killing machine.

Quote from: Butt, Joe. “Extraverted Sensing Feeling Judging”. Typelogic.com, http://typelogic.com/esfj.html.

18This is an example of me being an insane person and setting completely unrealistic goals. In the anthology it says that as a judging person, setting “unambitious goals” should be a weakness of mine. I definitely have the opposite problem from that. I am constantly setting goals that I am fully aware I will never achieve. The cheesy explanation for this is that, as my mom used to say, if you reach for the moon, and you don't make it, at least you'll still be among the stars. The non-cheesy explanation is that I like the feeling of setting about an impossible task. If I had to be specific about what that feeling is, I'd say it's akin to panic: The panic of knowing that if you don't give it you're all, you won't even be close to achieving your goal.

Quote from: DiTiberio, John K. and George H. Jensen. “Approaches to Writing.” In E 603 Composition and Reading in World Literature Fall 2009, Compiled by Jerome Bump, 154.

19This is a metaphor meaning that, though I am sweating, it is a cold sweat that just serves to amplify the arctic conditions of the race.

20Joe Butt also says that ESFJ's do not “infrequently [boil] over with the vexation in their souls”. Notice, though, that I am perfectly capable of controlling myself. I do not run around “boiling over” on unsuspecting supportive photographer parent wannabees. I instead channel my emotions so that they can become useful.

Quote from: Butt, Joe. “Extraverted Sensing Feeling Judging”. Typelogic.com, http://typelogic.com/esfj.html.

21Runners get really ridiculously tired when they're racing, and they sometimes forget what lap they're on, so as a courtesy, when the first-place runner starts her last lap they ding a bell to let them know they're almost done.

22Puerto Rican for OH MY GOD.

23It being to finish first.

24Butt

25At this point in the story, I am, like E.M. Forster, “[living] in fragments no longer”. I have unified all of my conflicting emotions towards this race (the feeling that I was pushed into it, the competitive pull set by the pink scrunchy, and my loyalty to my team) and come up with the verdict: I love this sport. Awesomely enough, it was the Hammer I used at the end of this race that made this possible. Literally and figuratively, I “[hammered my] thoughts into unity” .

Quote from: Bump, Jerome. “Goals.” In E 603 Composition and Reading in World Literature Fall 2009, 15.

My Psychological Type: ESFJ

My type is ESFJ, which is, you know... SUPER EXCITING!!

According to this test I am 1% extraverted (you

were right Professor Bump!), 1% sensing, 75% feeling (which means I'm a huge sap) and 67% judging.

Anyhow, when I looked at my results I was pretty confused, mainly because I didn't know what all the words in my type were referring to. And then, thankfully, I used my superior skills of deduction, read our anthology and clicked on a few of the explaining links .

Lightbulbs are often used to symbolize awesome ideas, such as my idea to look up what the words in my type meant http://chrissylee.files.wordpress.com/2009/02/lightbulb.jpg

I was a much bigger fan of Dr. Keirsey's explanation of my type then J Butt's and MM Heiss's. First of all, Keirsey called me a Guardian (with a capital G!). Who wouldn't want to be one of those? I am a fan of social service, although I think it might just be because I like the way it makes me feel when other people are happy, which really means I'm horribly selfish. I used to work at IHOP as a waitress, and I think part of the reason I liked that job and was good at it was that the main goal was to keep people happy, which I am apparently a pro at. And teamwork is AWESOME! The one thing that seemed to be a main theme of Dr. Keirsey's explanation of my type that didn't really fit in with me was that Keirsey implied that Providers are good at organizing parties and like... being in charge. Let me tell you, I am TERRIBLE at being in charge. The teamwork thing I've got in the bag, but the planning should really be left to someone with an eye for details (a.k.a. NOT ME).

Summer after my sophomore year in high school I worked at IHOP. I was actually really good at my job and had a few regular customers who I got to know really well (because I am an extrovert, apparently) but IHOP is open 24 hours a day and my mother was not thrilled with my work schedule so she made me quit. I loved it though. Breakfast food is the best! http://www.phx411.com/food/reviewed/images/ihop.jpg

I do tend to strike up random conversations with people, but that's mainly in elevators when its just you and one other sad elevator traveler. It's so awkward if you don't talk to them! Friends and family are important to me too. However, I don't know what provider this Keirsey person has been talking to, but I personally am very, very bad about birthdays. It's embarrassing. I wish I were good about them, as my type description says I should be. I “can remember names and dates” (Learning Styles, page 138) when it comes to school, like in history, but it takes a lot of repetition and I usually forget details right after the test. And the whole “I KNOW EVERYONE'S BUSINESS” aspect of my type isn't really my thing either... although that might just be because I don't have time. Maybe I should drop out of school and become Perez Hilton: Lauren Acosta's friends version. I mean, it does say in our anthology that I prefer to write about “topics [I] can care about” (Writing Styles, page 153). It could be the perfect job!

Awkward elevators are actually one of my favorite things because they provide so much bonding material. These people are unhappy because they have failed to take advantage of the bonding experience before them. The blonde kid looks especially unhappy, in my opinion. http://thumbnails.hulu.com/6/885/14644_512x288_manicured__mi3shsSVCUGm8a7UkSAcWw.jpg

I am very sensitive to what other people are thinking and what they think of me. That probably explains my obsession with happy endings... But really, we spend our whole lives hoping happy things will happen to people. Why would we want to go watch a movie about another instance where it doesn't work out?

However, I was as thrilled when I read what is in store for my future. I don't know if any of y'all looked at the little blurbs on other people of our types, but my fellow Provider Sheryl was apparently very popular with the laddies (not ladies, laddies) in high school. She turns out really pathetic though! She dresses up to impress her husband who is this huge jerk that leaves his socks all around the house. Honestly, she needs to stop being so mousy and just go off on him. That is not happening to me, kids, partly because the first part of her story does not match my life at all and mostly because I'm not going to let it happen to me.

I always thought Cinderella was the dumbest of the Disney princesses because she, like Sheryl, just let people take advantage of her and was not even that bitter/ vocal about it. She is a TERRIBLE role model. http://students.ou.edu/P/Lesley.B.Pierce-1/cindyclean.gif

And then... and then comes Joe Butt. First of all, let me go ahead and say that he has an slightly terrible name, but I find myself wondering if he is related to the famous Herbert E Butt, the founder of HEB. (picture of HEB). He says some of the same things that Keirsey does, but I (true to my “easily wounded” self, as he put it) was slightly offended by the manner in which he described Providers. This may be because “small things upset me” (Typology Assessment, pg 143) but I'd like to think I'm being completely reasonable in my dislike of his description. I know how to control my emotions, OK? I answered that I don't have a problem expressing my feelings if need be, but I don't go around blowing up at the random stranger friends that I've made in elevators because I'm “boiling over the vexation of [my] soul”.

According to Mr. Butt I should also be walking around with ticks from trying to control my urge to save the world. He's quite melodramatic in this description as well, although I do see what he's referring to. I'm pretty protective, which is probably why I'm a good babysitter. However, the whole rescuing “the prodigal... from the gallows of the folly just as the noose tightens and all hope is lost” when referring to my punishment and making up style was a bit much. Really, I usually make a joke out of whatever crisis has occurred and tell the kid not to do it again because something horrible will happen.

And OH MY GOODNESS JOE'S LAST PARAGRAPH IS RIDICULOUS. I am not hyper vigilant! I feel like this paragraph perfectly describes my mother. I'm pretty chill about dangerous things. I think the reason this came up was because I said I usually follow the rules. Following the rules does not mean I see creepers around every corner, however.

I was pretty happy with my list of fellow ESFJ's, however. I mean, who wouldn't want to be categorized with Donald Duck, Winnie the Pooh, and Frank Sinatra? (pics) Martha Stewart I could do without, but all in all I seem to have some pretty good compadres.

So, all in all, my type matched me pretty well. I just think that some of the aspects of my personality were not quite as extreme as the descriptions made them out to be.