Random Facts About Josie: Some of the Weird Things I've Done

I'm going to go ahead and lie to you in this post.

I recently posted an epic list of the crazy stuff I've done on Instagram, along with one lie, and asked people to guess which one was the lie!  Over 500 people chimed in, and a few people even got the answer right!  Including my husband (good job honey) but NOT my BFF.  (And you thought you knew me!)

 A lot of of folks were like… what??? You've run marathons?  Climbed mountains?  Pooped in a cab???? So I thought a explanatory note for some of these was necessary.

 I climbed Kilimanjaro.

I'm not really an athletic person really, but they said Kilimanjaro is a "non-technical" climb. So I hiked right up it.  No problem. It took about 7 days, and it's really, really high--19,341 feet.  I got sick from altitude sickness, and it was hard, but also I made it!

I’ve been to 56 countries.

Partial list: USA, Canada, Dominican Republic, Jamaica, Haiti, Brazil, Argentina, England, Ireland, Scotland, France, Germany, Holland, Belgium, Switzerland, Denmark,  Italy, Austria, Slovenia, Italy, Egypt, Greece, Cyprus, Israel, Kenya, Tanzania, South Africa, Lesotho, Ethiopia, India, Nepal, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, Malaysia, Indonesia, South Korea… to name a few.  I'm forgetting a bunch. There's more.  I've also been to Texas, which is it's own continent.

I ran 4 marathons.

Yes, in about a 2 year span I ran a lot of miles, until I got injured rollerblading (for the first and last time I ever rollerbladed).

I went to art college for 8 years.

Okay well I was an art major at a regular college, so maybe that's stretching it if you’re going to be a stickler.  But I went to 1 year PSEO (senior year at college) and then 4 regular years at a liberal arts school as an art major, then 3 years at grad school to get my MFA so there you have it: 8 years. 

I grew up with wood heat.  

True story, in the deep woods in northern Minnesota. With horses. And an outhouse.

I cut my hand really badly and got 200 stitches. 

When I was about 12 I fell on some broken class, and cut my palm from index finger to pinky.  I cut through a few tendons, and that's where the stitches come in.  They were these teeny micro stitches inside my hand that dissolved over time, and it was a 3 hour surgery. Then I had to wear a cast for 3 months while my hand healed.  I didn't count 'em up personally, that's just what the doc told me.

 I met Tim Allen from tool time.

Okay, this was the fib.  I didn't meet him, but I did walk down the street next to him for a while.  I didn't recognize him.  Later my friend was like, did you know that was Tim Allen from Home Improvement?  Nope, nope I did not know that.  Also no words were exchanged.  So no meeting happened.  But it could have!

 I met the artist Chuck Close, twice.

I was working at the Walker Art Museum in Minnesota and artist Chuck Close had a major retrospective.  I met him then, and then months later I ran into him at the Guggenheim Museum in NYC and chatted with him again.

 I lived in a commune with 20 other people.

Yes, yes I did, in a huge house in Minnesota, for about 3 years.  It was great.  Then I started my own artist commune, with about 4 people, and that was great too. Now I just have a micro-commune with my husband and my kid.  But I’ll tell you what, I know all about how to deal with household conflict.

On a winter walk, I found myself in the middle of a wild wolf pack in northern MN.

This is true, a once in a lifetime event.  I was walking on a county road in the winter, and the wolves crossed the road where I was walking, and it was crazy and weird and magical and terrifying.

I accidentally pooped my pants in a cab in India after eating sketchy street food.  Listen, I eat everything, everywhere, and I've been horribly foodsick so many times I can't even count.  HORRIBLY.  I remember pooping in a cab at least once but honestly, I think it's happened other times too.  When traveling, pooping (frequency, consistency, pain involved) becomes kind of a major part of the trip.  And I STILL eat all the food, because it’s so worth it. If you haven’t eaten noodles from a rickety street cart in Bangkok YOU HAVEN’T LIVED.

I’ve ridden a camel and an elephant, though not at the same time.

The camel around the Egyptian pyramids, that was fun, and as a bonus the guide proposed to me but he was suggesting I become the “second wife” and that was kind of a deal breaker, and then I rode an elephant near the Taj Mahal.

So there you have it! I squeezed a lot of adventures out of my 20s and early 30s. By the way, I funded all these adventure MYSELF. I don’t got no trust fund. No one ever gave me any money. I paid for travel and college by waiting tables and selling art. Key elements: living cheap, driving crappy cars, and having a lousy hand-me-down sofa.

My life has been pretty tame since I had a kid 7 years ago, but I sense a time coming when I'll be busting lose again!

To learn more about my art world and how I love to support creatives, go here!