Random Fun Facts about Me

I once saw Elvis Presley live in concert. My parents took me when I was in sixth grade. Elvis was in his “big bell bottoms and wide belt buckle phase” by then, but he was still King of Rock n’ Roll.

I don’t consider myself adventurous, but I’ve somehow managed to skydive from an airplane (with a tandem expert strapped to my back, of course); gone white water rafting without being thrown from the raft in a Class IV rapid; and ridden at 125 miles per hour in a race car on a motor sport track (no, I wasn’t the one behind the wheel).

College football: now that’s my sport. I scream with the fans from my couch. I can’t help myself.

My husband and I married six weeks after I graduated from high school. He’d been out of school a good bit longer. Two years later, I became a mother. We've been married forty-eight years and are still having fun!

It wasn’t until my late twenties that I started college. I received the Top Graduate award in my major at Indiana University. It was cool that my boys were there to see it.

The public library I went to as a kid in my hometown of Columbus, Indiana (population 40,000) was designed by I.M. Pei, the architect who later designed the glass pyramids at the Louvre. The American Institute of Architects has actually ranked Columbus 6^th in our country for architectural innovation and design—behind Chicago, New York, Boston, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C.

I don’t drink coffee. I don’t drink sodas. I don’t drink tea. But I’m addicted to chocolate.

My children still tease me about the time we went to Disney World. I packed a daily itinerary written on color-coded index cards: pink for the Magic Kingdom attractions, blue for Epcot, and green for Pleasure Island as it was known then. Cards even had “planned spontaneity time.” (Okay, I confess to being a planner, but I’ve loosened up a lot since then. I think.)

Like many authors, I have two complete novels “sitting in a drawer” that never got published. I didn’t give up.

My favorite quote is from Oprah: “You can have it all. You just can’t have it all at once.”

On our 30^th wedding anniversary, my husband and I stood at the top of the Eiffel Tower.

My paternal great-grandmother, center, was the daughter of a full-blooded Osage Native American mother. My Memaw, posed opposite her brother, was fourteen in this photo taken in the mid-1930s. Very little is known of my ancestors' Native American heritage, and I hope to one day learn more. But I can say this: The Osage Nation has long considered the drum the heartbeat of their culture. Today, my brother, eldest son, and teenaged granddaughter form three living generations of amazing drummers. I like to think their talent and passion for drumming carried through from our lineage.

If I had to pick a favorite food, it would surely be potatoes. Twice baked potatoes, au gratin potatoes, hashed brown potatoes, and mashed. I also have Irish blood in me. And German, too.

For years before my mom passed away, she lived in Indiana and we texted back and forth through every episode of The Bachelor. I miss this and all little moments with her!

I was forty-eight years old before I ever ran a mile. I’d always walked. In my fifties, I competed in a mini triathlon—a quarter-mile swim in a lake, a 10-mile bike ride, and a 5K run. I came in last. But I finished.

The first car I bought with my own money was a used 1969 Camaro, in blue. I was 16.

I fell in love with history at age five. I vividly recall standing before cars from the early 1900s at a museum I’d visited with my grandparents. One of my greatest joys in life has been taking my own grandchildren to historical places.

Tori Whitaker