Tyrannosaurus Arms

Right now, our apartment is probably as messy as it’s ever been. There are dishes in the sink, junk mail and fast food containers everywhere, and many magazines about. And yet I’m sitting here writing. I call it “creative avoidance.” Did you ever see one of those signs or bumper stickers that say “I’d rather be fishing” or something like that? Well, I want one that says “I’d rather be writing.” Wow, that sounded pretty lame. Nevertheless, it’s true.

But eventually I know I will need to roll up my sleeves and tackle the mess. (Now don’t get your undies in a bundle—Iwanski will of course help, too!) I don’t actually mind cleaning that much—especially since the day that Iwanski pointed out that while I’m cleaning, I often exhibit a very strange behavior.

You see, while I’m going around the house picking items up and putting them in their proper places, I often (unconsciously, of course) leave my arms out in front of me (folded at the elbow) as I walk from place to place. Here is a photo so you know what I’m talking about.



Iwanski promptly nicknamed this strange behavior “tyrannosaurus arms.” I have, of course, developed a whole tyrannosaurus character from this, who screeches “Aaaaaaa!” while hunting for household objects to pick up. (I was making that noise while the picture above was taken—can you tell?)

Then the funniest thing happened. A couple of months after the discovery of the t-rex arms behavior, we were visiting with my parents, and all of the sudden Iwanski noticed that my Mom was doing tyrannosaurus arms! Then later in the day, we noticed that my Grandma was also doing tyrannosaurus arms! And then one by one, we began noticing that all of the women in my family shared this same strange behavior. It was a family phenomenon!—but interestingly, it was only the women in my family. Why? We have no idea. It must have been passed on from Grandma, to Mom, to her daughters. I wonder if my great-Grandmother also did t-rex arms? Hmmm…I’ll have to scour over the old pictures more closely in the future. And what if—oh, what if!—one of my ancestors was an actual t-rex?

So a few years ago, at a family wedding, a bunch of us were getting together for a family photo, and we decided to do a tyrannosaurus arms photo. Here’s the picture. Notice that of course, only the women are doing tyrannosaurus arms. Iwanski insisted upon it. We all got a good laugh out of that one.



I have to say, of all the traits that the women in my family share, this is my absolute favorite one. How could it not be? It’s a pretty weird behavior, don’tcha think?

And now, unfortunately, I must stop my creative avoidance and actually start doing some cleaning. But at least I get to make Iwanski laugh when I begin t-rexing it up.