25 Things I Carry in My Purse

I just started work on my 510th lens: 25 Things In My Purse. As you can see from the title I've reached the point where I aim coming up with weird random nonsense for lens topics, rather than my usual long winded essays on everything under the sun. LOL!

I got the idea for that lens title from the Giant Squid Training Camp Weekly Lens Challenge which states:

[QUOTE=]

>Select an "About Me" Topic. Be creative and have fun. Here are some ideas >to pick from or make up your own!
>
>--10 things I want to do in the next 5 years.
>--My favorite "furry" kids.
>--My 5 favorite restaurants in my town.
>--My hometown: Where I grew up and my memories of it.
>--25 things that I carry in my purse
>--The 5 people who have influenced me the most.
>-- A peek into my closet. The clothes that define me.
>--The 7 things I would NEED with me on a desert (and deserted) island.
>--My life in pictures.
>--My next vacation will be to: _______
>--10 things I would secretly love to get for my next birthday...

[/QUOTE]

Well, I like that. I may just make each and every one of those ideas into a lens too. You know me, never too many lenses, and now that I'm retired from Squid Angeling, I'll have time to create even more lenses than before. Okay, so I thought it would be a great idea to write not just one of the lenses suggested, but rather a series of "About Me" lenses, each on some random topic of weirdness, and this is the first on them.

~EK

I know some women who would be hard pressed to find 25 things in their purses, due to the fact that their purses are so small. I am not one of these women. My purse is almost a tote bag, and it would not be hard for me to come up with a list of 100 things in it. My purse is a large shoulder bag made of red, pink, purple, and blue striped mud-cloth.

Okay - so it's not the first thing I pulled out of my purse. I didn't even take them out. But I know they are there - I have who knows how many library cards, but I have a library card for each of the local libraries, though some folks marvel at what I call "local" seeing how some of these libraries are a 2 hour drive from me in Old Orchard Beach. However, when you are either autistic or homeless (and I am both) finding people willing to do anything other than snub their nose at you is almost as hard as finding some one to talk with, and the end result is I spend most of my waking hours in libraries doing research on whatever the latest thing I want to learn happens to be. I take out between 15 to 30 books from each library each week. And one library - the Biddeford one, I usually have 75+ books checked out. To say that I am anything other than a book worm would be inaccurate. But the most used thing in my purse is of course my library cards, so I know they are in there and I don't have to even bother to look, thus they are the first thing on my list.

This is not something that is normally in my purse. I had ordered them off Etsy a few days ago and they just arrived in the mail, and being busy at the time, I stuffed the mail in my bag and went back to what I was doing before the mail had come. Thus when I started pulling things out of my purse, these 2 patterns were among the things in it.

Well, there are a bunch of autographs in my purse actually, David Draiman is just the first (and most famous) name in my autograph book, which I keep with me at all times, because hey, you never know when you'll meet some one famous. So far I have meet ten famous and semi-famous guys, all musicians, and all with their scrawling nearly illegible paw prints in my notebook. :) David Draiman is sooooo cute in person!

Pens. Several of them. Mostly BIC crystal stix.

I'm a writer, I go through several pens each week, so always have 6 or 7 or more in my purse. My writing materials are always with me at all times because you never know when an idea will pop up, and you'll lose the idea if you don't write it down immediately.

I write everything I read and hear down, so I go through a lot of pens.

Hhmmmm. . . I have an interesting purse to say the least. There is a story behind this watch and why I have it. As many people know, there were a series of strange as yet unexplained "events" which took place during my childhood.

Depending on who you ask, people will tell you everything from the fact that they believe I am a poltergeist to the belief that I am demon possessed to the theory that I am a victim of alien abduction. Me? What do I say? Well, it's been 30 years and I still have no explanation for the strange things that happened to me and people around me. I do know this however: I can not wear a watch, use a camera, or have any clocks in my house.

I buy a watch on average once every 3 months. I buy a new clock about every 6 months. I average having to buy 2 digital cameras a year - 3 in 2009. I can not use calculators either - went through 5 in the past year. Why? I do not know. All I know is that after a few weeks in contact with me, watches, clocks, calculators, and cameras simply stop working. The face plates turn an oily black color, the inner gears corrode, and the electronics inside "freeze. Batteries in any object are known to heat up, explode, or start leaking, thus I avoid using battery operated objects.

Now for this particular silver pocket watch found in my purse. It is a very expensive watch. I bought it about 7 years ago. After more than 200 watches, all dead without explanation, it was suggested to me, by a friend, that maybe if I bought a high end quality watch, instead of a cheap "WalMart watch" than maybe, it would last more than 3 months, and so, I set out to find a high quality watch guaranteed to last 25 years. This watch last about 6 months, before it simply stopped. It outlasted my previous watches, but it did not outlast them by much.

In the past several years since the watch died, I have kept it with me, so that every time I pass a jeweler, I take it in and ask them to take a look at it. Several years and many jewelers later, no one has yet to explain why the watch stopped working. There is nothing physically wrong with the watch, the batteries replaced and re-replace, tested and found to have nothing wrong with them. As one man said jokingly: "It's like it's simply frozen in time." And so this watch, the last watch I would ever spend money on, remains with me always, a constant reminder, that for some odd and inexplicable reason, I can not come into contact with watches, clocks, or other small electronic items without them ceasing to work.

A small white Bible, with only the New Testament and a few pieces of the Old Testament in it.

I have carried this Bible with me for 18 years, 10 months, and 16 days.

There is a reason most of the locals call me a Jesus Freak. I took 12 years of Bible Seminary (through a Calvinist private school), starting when I was 9 years old, with classes that lasted 2 hours a day, 7 days a week. My goal was originally to become a teacher at a private Christian College. The fact that I started that goal at the very young age of 9 years old is testament to just exactly how much of a Jesus Freak I really am. At 9 years old I had read the entire King James Bible from cover to cover in the space of 3 months, than immediately read it again. In the nearly 30 years since than I have read the Bible straight through cover to cover from "In the Beginning" to "Omega" well over 300 times, this does not include random scripture study, nor does it take into account the twelve years of lessons.

When I was 9 I also made my first cover to cover readings of The Book of Mormon, The Doctrines and Covenants, The Pearl of Great Price, and the Book of Moses. Each of which I have since read multiple times since than, including to have read the B of M a grand total of 14 times.

Additionally, I have read 16 other translations of the Bible besides the KJV and the PNG Pigdin Bible. I have also read the Koran and most of the other Eastern texts. Other books I have read include the Gospel of Thomas, The Dead Sea Scrolls, The Lost Books of the Bible, The Missing Books of the Bible, The Book of Enoch, and too many others to make an attempt at listing them all.

Most of the famous multi-volume concordances have been read and studied, with a large focus on those written by Calvin, Wesley, Steiner, and E.G. White. Though I am a Mormon, my religious beliefs also lean heavily on Calvinism and Seventh Day Adventist.

I am also to the great dismay of the Mormon Church leadership, ordained to be a minister, and have a license to preach, marry, baptize, preform funeral services, and am authorized to start a new religion and a church to promote it, in the State of Maine, though I have yet to act upon this.

In short, Jesus is the center of my life, and though online you will rarely hear me talk much about my outlandish and rampant Jesus Freak mania, offline and in person, it's impossible to have face to face contact with me without being instantly overburdened by my extremist Jesus Freakism. And now you know why I am never seen without a Bible with me at all times.

This is no ordinary white rock and it's not here at random.

A very special white rock. I have carried it with me for 18 years, 5 months, and 2 days. It is a symbol of my official, though deeply hidden secret marriage to my beloved high priest. A secret which, considering recent events, I no longer wish to keep a secret any longer. I am tired of being the hidden wife, separated from her husband by a church that values religion over family.

The white was given to me by my boyfriend on my 16th birthday. (My boyfriend btw is/was a Mormon high priest 30 years older than me - something that caused quite a bit of outrage with several members of our local church and has resulted in some terrible acts of vandalism and violence, including the arsine fire that resulted in my becoming homeless.) We had been together 4 years by that point, and had walked with my dog Muffin from my house to the beach and it was there that we exchanged marriage vows between each other and God.

Having no ring, we exchanged a pair of small white pebbles found under the Pier of Old Orchard Beach, Maine, in the tradition of the old Celestial Weddings of the early days of the LDS church (exchange of white rocks is a Mormon "thing" that today is still only done by the most devote and extremist of the LDS members.)

No witnesses and no bishop present on the beach that day 18 years, 5 months, and 2 days ago, has since resulted in his public denial of our marriage when confronted by a bishop, 7 years ago, about this secret wedding. Accussed of being a pediphile, my beloved high priest had his temple recommend taken from him, lost his rank in church leadership, and was threatened with excommunication if he did not cease all contact with me, on orders from the church leadership, my beloved high priest choice to deny that the marriage ever happened and cast me away. Unfortunately, his love for the church proved far greater than his love for me.

After my high priest's self proclaimed "best friend" McEvoy advised I file charges against my high priest husband and have his put in prison for being a pedophile, I am no longer allowed to attend church, accused of being a whore and a harlot because of my refusal to press charges against the man I love.

Today, 18 years, 5 months, and 2 days later, I still go no where without this white rock with me, for the man who gave it to me was my life, I love him more than anything or any one in the entire world. It breaks my heart that a church that claims to promote families, would tear a family apart like they did me and my high priest. I miss him terribly, and not a day goes by that I do not wish I had the courage to end my life. For life without him is hell. Without him, I have nothing to live for. I miss him so much. I keep this white rock with me at all times in his memory.

Hmmmm - looks like I need to get a new appointment book, seeing how it's now 2010. I will have to put that on my list of things to do.

How utterly boring. But yep, I'm sitting here pulling things out of my purse and thing #9 was my savings and loan checkbook in a navy blue plastic binder. Old and cracked, should probably be replaced, and whoops, I needs to get more checks as there are only 2 left in it!

There is one interesting thing to note though, not about the checkbook, but about the bank itself. You must never call their bank I use a bank, because if you do, the tellers will be quick to correct you and remind you that they are a savings and loan instatution not a bank, thus explaining how they were the only creditor in Maine to survive the Great Depression. They will than continue by giving you a detailed history of their "bank" and it's famous collection of antique Grandfather Clocks.

Honestly, it was their collection of antique clocks that was the reason I chose them for my banking more than 20 years ago. Silly I know, but, I love antique clocks, I'm fascinated with time pieces in general, and the fact that I can go into their building and tell the time, is well, pretty amazing, considering my trouble with clocks.

I do know why their clocks don't go kaput when I enter the bank: they are wind up clocks from the 1800's.

I have teeth problems and many, many, many thousands of dollars of dental work including several porcelain teeth to prove it. A long term side effect of being homeless and an expensive one to have fixed, but now results in my paranoia at obsessively brushing and flossing my teeth.

There's a toothbrush here in my bag somewhere as well.

I can't go outside without these, not even at night. I suffer from severe photosensitivity, which is the reason I have 2 cars but no driver's license. I have no lights in my room, because of it. I can not enter a room in which there are light bulbs brighter than 40 watts, unless I am wearing these dark sunglasses on top of my regular glasses. These are the darkest lenses my eye doctor could find, and even with them on, I can not go outside between 10 AM to 3 PM due to my severe sensitivity to sunlight, which completely blinds me.

Without my regular eyeglasses I can see almost exactly 4 inches, which makes me legally blind. With my glasses I can see several feet, but not clearly. However, in the sunlight, street lights at night, car head lights, or bulbs over 40 WATTS in a room, I am totally blind, if I am not wearing these dark glasses to defuse the light. My eye's have been like this since I was 8 eyes old, since the day of the "UFO sighting".

I lost both my eyesight and my ability to wear watches on the same day. To date, no one has ever been able to explain what happened to me that day. No one can explain what it was I saw, how it blinded me, or why I have not been able to wear a watch since that day.

Not a particularly interesting thing here. Just the keys to my little 16 year old black Volvo. The keyring is a bit interesting though. It was designed by my brother. I bought it off his Zazzle store and well, I can thus add a link to it below so you can see what it looks like.


EMo & Goth Skulls and Hearts by FlashAllen
Browse other Keychains

Before the fire I had very, very, very, long hair. I lost a good 10 or 12 inches of it the day of the fire, seeing how I was outside of the house and my 2 dogs and 9 cats were inside of the house. I ran in to bring them out and my long hair and my cloths caught fire. The firemen said I am lucky to be alive at all and the fact that I only lost my hair is a miracle. It was the day that the vandalism at the hands of a few religious locals went to the extreme and the day I also became homeless.

My long hair was my pride and joy though and without it, I became super extremely depressed, though few people who saw me, my boyfriend included, were even aware of the fact that for nearly 2 years I had very short hair. The ponytail holders are the reason. What little hair I had left was rearranged into an "Olive Oil" roaring 20's flapper style bun and remained there for 2 years. I never took it down, never brushed my hair, and the entire time I was homeless, my hair got wash, while still tied in a bun. I did not remove my hair from the bun until it had grown back.

A bottle of eye glasses lens cleaner which a woman at WalMart was handing out free samples of a few weeks ago.

Now here's an oddity. With an income of $200 a month and a 19 cat cat-food bill of $150 a month, it's a rare thing that I have any cash left over after buying cat food. An explanation - my boyfriend paid for the cat food for 2 weeks, thus I have two weeks worth of money left over a total of: a twenty dollar bill, a five dollar bill, and 3 one dollar bills, which I will use to buy a few bales of hay this afternoon. Hay is the best thing to pack around the tent, to keep the cold out, and the weather being below zero right now, I could use a lot of bales of hay.

A Kingston 1GB DataTraveler. The secret to how I can build my Squidoo lenses from dozens of library internet terminals across Southern Maine.

Made of pewter, with a cross charm and a crystal bead. It has an angel on the front and the following quote on the back:

Angel of God, my guardian dear,
To whom his love commits me here,
Ever this day be at my side,
To light and guard,
To rule and guide.
Amen

The non-bank with the clocks again, this time it's my savings book.

I don't normally have this in here. It's the dead of winter right now though (January 15, 2010) so, I keep an extra long knit scarf in my bag.

You'll note I said "extra" - that means in addition to the 12 foot striped Doctor Who scarf I wear all the time, spring, summer, fall, and winter. :)

Tom Baker was my first Doctor Who, and remains still today my fave Doctor, as well as my second most commonly worn CosPlay after Naraku. Calling it CosPlay is not quite accurate, seeing how I dress in "costume" every day and don't own a thread of "normal" clothen. Most days I wear Naraku's blue and purple kimono set, but than other days I'm in a long frock coat and huge stripe knit scarf. In the winter, I do both at the same time. Called mixed CosPlay, but as I said, these being my daily cloths, technically it's not CosPlay and thus I can mix and match at will.

I collect scarves, and have several dozen of them - all knitted in every color you could imagine. I use them for Obi for my kimonos. This time of year, we get temperatures below zero, so a second long knit scarf stays in my bag this time of year.

I always have some sort of sewing thing with me. Sometimes it's my crochet, sometimes cross stitch, sometimes crewel embroidery, sometime Japanese kimono embroidery, sometimes needlepoint, sometimes crazy quilting. It depends on my mood and what my current projects I'm working on are.

This week, I'm making hand hooked doll house rugs, as one of my hobbies includes 1/12 scale building, which includes doll houses, cars, bonsai, doll house dolls, and doll house furnishings. This week I'm working on hand hooked rugs in 1/12 scale, thus found among everything else in my purse, is a punch needle.

Always there, regardless of the project, but embroidery floss is used in all my projects and so it is always here.

My Volvo has a CD player. I can stay warm in the car and listen to music. Rather than chatter about them, I'll just list them below:

I did say I had a really big purse, you can tell just by the fact that this items fits in it.

Why do I have a roll of toilet paper in my purse? Well, a few reasons.

First off, I am allergic to almost everything under the sun and am prone to a runny nose as a result. So, I can't really go any where with out tissues, but than tissues are always scented and dusty and thus I can not use them!

Secondly, I suffer from an over active bladder, which sends me looking for a bathroom 2 or 3 times every hour, every day. The result of which is I know where every public bathroom in the entire Greater Portland Area is. I can't give you directions to the buildings, but I can give you directions through the buildings to the restrooms. :) The problem is this: Do you have any idea how often you get into the bathroom stall only to find the toilet paper roll is empty? Yeah, So keeping a roll in my bag, really, not something I can go without.

Thirdly, uhm, I'm somewhat borderline OCD. I got germ issues, and clean off everything before I touch it. My keeping immaculately clean, is part of the reason why few strangers who meet me are aware of the fact that I am homeless, seeing how most people have this stereotyped idea of the fact that homelessness = being filthy and dirty.

A 16oz bottle of water, stays with me at all times. When you are homeless, you never know when or where you'll be able to find something to drink, so it's best to keep your own drink with you always. It's one of the lessons I learned during my time living on the streets, and a lesson I'm not soon to forget. You can go 4 or 5 days with out food and often have too, but it's difficult to go more than a day without something to drink.

Blame it on my OCD tendencies, but yeah, I tend to not use utensils other than my own. I am trying to "get over it" as some folks say, so I try to use the utensils restaurant provide, but than I wash them first.

Several years ago, I was in a public bathroom, looking for some thing in my purse, and not finding what I was looking for had taken everything out and had it dumped all over the sink counter. A woman watching what I was doing made an interesting observation, when she pointed out that I had everything under the sun in my purse, and yet, I had none of the "normal" items a woman "should" have in her purse. She explained that every girl she knew had lip stick, eye shadow, mascara, a comb, a hair brush, and hairspray in her purse. The woman was stunned and visibly baffled at the fact that these items were missing from my bag's contents.

Okay. Well, as a teenager I wore more make up than Jem and Alice Cooper combined, but I was 21 years old the last time I wore make up, and well, that was nearly 20 years ago! I don't wear make up so, what would I be doing with any in my purse? And as for the brush and comb? I do not own either. I've never brushed or combed my hair and really, I don't see any reason too either. So, again, these items are missing from my purse as well.

The content of this lens was created by Wendy C. Allen compiled from posts on EK's Star Log, the official blog of author and artist Wendy C. Allen, a.k.a. EelKat. Reprinted here on Squidoo with permission.

EK's Star Log Copyright © Wendy C. Allen 2005-2008. Star Log, Space Dock 13, The Twighlight Manor Press, Moonsnails, Buried Treasue, Copper Cockeral, and Xavier's Nest Copyright © Wendy C. Allen 2005-2007. Twighlight Manor, EelKat, White Rock Asylum, Planet Ptarmagin, Crystonite Chronicles, Etiole, Sir Roderic, The Swanzen Family, and all other related characters, info, writings, names, images, and content Copyright © Wendy C. Allen 1978-2008. Reuse of these names, characters, writings, and images are not allowed without prior authorization.

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