August is my birthday month. I believe it’s important to celebrate birthdays. I shared why in my birthday article last year: The Power of Celebrating Your Birthday. This year I want to share some fun to entertain you. You like fun right?

Fun is good.

Due to trauma in my life I had trouble with the idea of fun for a while (bizarre?), but not anymore.

Fun is one way we enjoy our lives. Even Jesus said one of the reasons he came was for us to enjoy our lives. I used to feel like that was bizarre.

A while back I was challenged to write an article revealing ten things about me that people didn’t know. I wrote it and published 10 Things About Me You Might Find Bizarre on a platform called medium dot com.

Here it is for your entertainment with one small change. #10 is different now.

The 10 things you don’t know about me challenge has been circling medium for a while and Colleen Golafshan tagged me in hers. So here I am with my contribution, but you might just find them bizarre.

No matter if you find them strange, bizarre or weird, I hope they touch your heart or make you laugh. 

1 — I ONCE LIVED WITH THIRTY DOGS

When I was a child my parents bred and raised Labrador retrievers. It started with one dog and grew from there.

It began as a hobby and became an obsession. We traveled around the country for field trials, shows and breeding.

My dad built a large whelping pen in our basement for the puppies. It was large enough to comfortably accommodate the twenty-five puppies we had from two separate litters at the same time. There were twelve in one and thirteen in the other.

Add the five adult dogs, and there were thirty dogs I was living with.

2 — I LED CATTLE DRIVES WHEN I WAS THIRTEEN

When I was in the eighth grade I had a teacher I loathed. I wasn’t the only one. The whole class wanted to make this poor woman’s life miserable.

I and another kid in the class took the leadership role to torment her.

Our favorite thing to do was leading what we called — a cattle drive.

This consisted of shouting “cattle drive” and the entire class sliding their desks and chairs toward the front of the room, mooing loudly. We thought it was hilarious. She did not.

I knew the vice principal very well that year.

3 — I MIGHT BE PART NOMAD

I love moving. Many people think I’m crazy to love moving. I love going through things when packing and either reminiscing or throwing things away.

Moving is like a new adventure. Not all adventures end up being fun. Likewise, not every place I’ve lived was wonderful.

My shortest stay was two weeks in Minneapolis, Minnesota. My longest was eight years in a huge house in Shelby Township, Michigan. The farthest I moved was from Michigan to Arizona and then back to Michigan five years later.

I’ve moved a total of thirteen times in my life — so far.

4 — MY MOM WAS NUTTY

In her later years my mom had a friend named Marge. They’d go out into the country foraging for food. Corn, cabbage, broccoli and other kinds of farm produce.

They also went looking for nut trees. Black walnuts and hickory nuts. When they found them, they’d bring a ton of them home.

Sometimes they’d find the tree on the side of the road. Other times it was clear the tree was on someone’s property. If it was on private property they’d go up to the stranger’s door to ask if they could gather some nuts. They were always met with a hearty yes because nut trees are messy.

Black walnuts and hickory nuts are delicious in baked goods but are difficult to open. My mom had a special inertia nutcracker.

I’d help her crack open the nuts for meat inside, so I guess that makes me nutty too.

5 — MY MARRIAGE WAS ARRANGED

I first met him when I was thirteen. We went to school together and he called me cabbage. I had no inkling he’d become my husband.

When I was nineteen I went on a six-week long road trip across the United States that changed the course of my life. (It’s by the grace of God alone that I lived to tell the tale.)

Less than a year later this guy reentered my life due to the new course my life was on. Just a few months prior, his life course had been altered by the same intervention.

That intervention is what caused our re-connection and saved us from destroying our lives.

Still I had no inkling. I had no interest in marrying anyone.

Three months later the arrangement began

.It was subtle at first, but as the days passed, the arrangement became clearer.

It wasn’t a matter of falling in love.

Instead, we both followed precise directions we believed God had given us. It was strange, but we weren’t the only ones aware of the supernatural pairing.

Only twenty-seven days later we became engaged in the most awkward way — supernaturally arranged.

The full story is in my book Emerging With Wings.

I looked like I was twelve, but we both had just turned 21.

6 — I ALMOST GOT MY MOTHER ARRESTED

I started doing drugs after my father died when I was fourteen. After I graduated high school I sold them to pay for my habit.

After my intervention, as mentioned above, I was still getting high and selling pot. I also planted seeds in my mother’s garden and named the plants after the four gospels — Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

That year my mother turned fifty and my brother threw her a party. He invited the neighbors and we had it in the back yard.

One of our neighbors was a police officer and inquired about my illegal plants in her garden. She told them they were spider plants.

I don’t know if he believed her or simply had mercy on her.

7 — I HAVE AN ADDICTION

For our twenty fifth wedding anniversary my husband and I went to Puerto Vallarta. This is where it began.

We went zip-ling for the first time at Canopy El Eden.

It was terrifying and exhilarating.

By the end of the course I was hooked.

I love the speed, the heights, hanging upside down and doing flips.

We’ve been zip-lining multiple times and in three countries.

Flying Hawaiian on Maui was the best. We were up so high on the mountain we could see the ocean on both sides of the island!

I read about a man breaking the Guinness World Record as the oldest man to zip-line at 106. I plan to break his record.

My husband and I look for places to go zip-lining on all our vacations.*

8 — WHEN I WAS 30 I ENTERED A WITNESS PROTECTION PROGRAM

The year I turned thirty I changed my name, how I looked and where I lived. It was all part of my healing process from multiple childhood traumas. I wasn’t trying to hide from anyone. I’d tried to hide from myself for many years.

The changes I made the year I turned thirty were a witness to the changes going on inside me.

One of the traumas involved my name. At the suggestion of my mother, I legally changed my first name.

Changing my name forever changed how I saw myself.

That year I overcame a bloody nail biting habit and grew out long beautiful nails. I also did the bold move of cutting my hair super short because my husband said he thought it would be cute.

When I turned 30 I changed who I was.

9 — I’M A BIT OF A PYRO

As a kid we used to burn our leaves in the street. I loved the smell. As a Camp Fire Girl, I had to learn how to build a fire so just one match would set it ablaze.

I love the smell of burning wood.

When my kids were growing up we had a fireplace. On Christmas morning we’d burn all the wrapping paper and boxes. My son is a bit of a pyro too now.

Now we live in a nicely wooded subdivision. It’s easy to find wood to burn and I have a nice fire pit to do so.

I find fire mesmerizing.

10 — I LIKE CRAZY HAIR

As you can see in the photo about my 30^th birthday I had super short hair.

I’ve also had very long hair and big perm hair. In high school I went to Cosmetology school and one time I put a thing on my hair called a semipermanent color – meaning it washed out after a while. It was red and I hated it so washed my hair repeated all weekend.

Isn’t it funny that my hair is a kind of red now? I call it fire hair.

But I came across this photo and started contemplating doing this to my hair.

Not sure if I have the courage or that my hair will actually do that.

But isn’t that bizarre?

WHAT NOW

I would love to hear what you thought about this in the comments.

• For details on my road trip story, and other stories get a copy of my first book Emerging With Wings: A True Story of Lies, Pain, and The LOVE that Heals.

*Fun little note. We had planned another anniversary trip in May 2020. On that trip we were to go ziplining at the longest zipline in North America located in New York. Due to the coronavirus pandemic we were not able to go. UPDATE: We have a new trip planned to Austin Texas in November 2021 where we will be able to go zipping on 10 zip-lines.

Danielle Bernock

Author, Coach, and Speaker helping men, women, and organizations EMERGE with clear vision of their value, TAKE ownership of their choices, and CHART a path to their promise, becoming Victorious Souls who Embrace The Change from survive to thrive through the power of the love of God

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