I walk into a shop filled with porcelain dolls *shudder* and suddenly everything in sight is a new world of textures and temperatures that I don't understand and will never understand until I undoubtedly lay a finger on every single thing on display.
I walk through the bulk spices section of Winco or Costco and suddenly I have to know what every type of grain or powder feels like and I just want to jam my hands into those plastic bins and mash everything around.
There's just some kind of craze that takes over my mind and I go from being a civil, germ-conscious, contributing member of society to a crazy-eyed toddler on a foreign planet full of things that need to be petted and stroked. (The same feeling overcomes me when I see "Fragile" signs.) This side of me flared up when I visited the county fair in August.
I love fairs. My dad invited me to go to the fair with him to look at all the 4H displays and photographs and barn animals. This was an overload for my senses.
First, you stick me in a big warehouse room full of rednecks and booths and my mind starts racing and my fingers start twitching. SO. MUCH. TO. BE. TOUCHED. We passed dozens of quilts and photo albums and mini dioramas of vegetation and flower arrangements and frosted cakes. These were all surrounded by "Do NOT touch" signs. "Do not touch" signs translate into "Touch more sneakily after looking over your shoulder to make sure nobody is watching" signs to Arielle and that is exactly what I did.
I couldn't control myself. How was I ever going to know if the blue denim quilt felt anything like the bleach denim quilt? How would I ever have known that rose petals and daisy petals feel remarkably similar? And for goodness sakes, how would I ever know what old, stale, hard cake frosting feels like?! (I actually feel really bad for touching food items, but I knew they weren't going to be eaten, some were growing mold.)
Let it be known that I made it out of the fair on my own without having to be kicked out. I even went and looked at all the cows and sheep and chickens and I kind of glanced at the pigs but didn't take the time to go look at them because they sort of freak me out. They're so pink and, well, naked. It's like I'm looking at weird naked alien people. (This is the same reason I don't like leather couches. They're like big, squishy, naked people that you sit on.)
Here are the conclusions I've come to:
a. I can't look at animals without imitating the sounds they make.
b. I can't look at animals without imitating the movements they make. (Chickens, for example.)
c. Every single chicken in the fair can make me laugh hysterically. Chickens are FUNNY.
d. Goats and sheep are sneaky little hungry devils that will trick you into standing near them so they can reach their heads through the bars and start eating your pants. And to think that I thought that sheep was just nuzzling!
Is it love? Or just my pants?
