Subject: Me!

I am interested in people. And I know I am not alone in my fascination—how else do you explain the popular activity of people-watching? Or the fact that reality shows seem to be on ALL THE TIME? Or that whenever you seem to be having a really personal conversation, you realize that everyone in the room has suddenly stopped talking and is now listening intently to you getting dumped (thanks to the waitress for the free drink, I guess)? People are interesting! And I don’t mean celebrities, I mean our neighbors, friends, family, the clerk at Target.

So I thought I would take the time to figure out what is going on with people—what are their stories? Where did they come from? What are they thinking? I know I’ll be fascinated and I hope you will too, if you are reading this. Each entry will be an interview with someone I think has something to say-- sometimes it will be a person who didn't realize he or she had something to say until someone came along and asked the right question. I will explain who the person is and probably add a photo—just in case anyone wants to date them. I figured it only makes sense to start with myself so here goes.

My name is Josefin O’Brien and I am a Seattle native currently living in Los Angeles so that means I hate valet parking and when I say, “I’ll be there at noon” that means I will be there at noon. I have worked as a writer and producer for TV and the online world for the last few years. My parents met at The Tip Toppers (which is a club for tall people—no joke) so consequently, I am the shortest member of my family at 5’11”. I have one brother who lives in West Seattle and one sister who lives in London. My likes and dislikes are boring so let’s get on with the interview (just one question for myself, we’ll see how it goes with everyone else).

Q: What is the biggest mistake you’ve ever made and how did you correct it (if you did)?

A: When I was in high school, I worked summers as a lifeguard (that’s not the mistake, but it’s relevant information). Of course there were a lot of other kids in the area that did this so we had to share shifts—sometimes you’d get a lot and sometimes not. Well, the summer after my sophomore year, a couple of people went on vacation at the same time and I got the opportunity to work the entire weekend, which would have meant an extra couple hundred bucks. I was pretty excited about it, thinking about all the ways I would spend my windfall before I had even worked the hours. But then my dad tells me he’s got some business he has to do in a town a few hours away and asks me if I’d like to go with him—we could take a road trip! Any other weekend, fine. This particular weekend, couldn’t do it. So that was it—my dad didn’t give me a hard time about it at all when I explained why I couldn’t go. He just said OK and he ended up flying to his business meeting and that was that. It didn’t feel like a momentous choice at the time but I guess every decision starts out that way—no big deal until it is one.

Well, my dad died a year and a half ago. And I keep thinking about that trip. What an idiot I was for choosing to stay and make some money that I probably spent on junk instead of hanging out with my dad! It’s not like we never talked and that was the only opportunity I ever had to get to know him, but I think when you lose someone permanently, you realize that there is no such thing as “quality time” because what you just want is “quantity time” and by that I mean, as much time as there is in existence. And it doesn’t have to be doing something fun or educational either—it can be spent sitting in a car, driving to a boring business meeting.