It's an honor just to be nominated

The lovely Diana has tagged me with the following meme. I am supposed to pick five of the following occupations and complete the sentiment, then add an occupation of my own choice to the end.

THE OCCUPATIONS:

If I could be a scientist...
If I could be a farmer...
If I could be a musician...
If I could be a doctor...
If I could be a painter...
If I could be a gardener...
If I could be a missionary...
If I could be a chef...
If I could be an archaeologist...
If I could be an architect...
If I could be a linguist...
If I could be a psychologist...
If I could be a librarian...
If I could be an athlete...
If I could be a lawyer...
If I could be an innkeeper...
If I could be a professor...
If I could be a writer...
If I could be a llama-rider...
If I could be a bonnie pirate...
If I could be a servicemember...
If I could be a business owner...
If I could be an actor...
If I could be an agent...
If I could be video game designer...
If I could be photographer...
If I could be a circus performer...
If I could be a spy...
If I could be a fashion designer...
If I could be a high school student again...
If I could be a clothing designer for very small dogs...
If I could be a restaurant critic... *

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If I could be a scientist...it would probably mean I had gotten a Ph.D. as I originally set out to do. It would mean I had picked an adviser who was an innovator, not just a number-cruncher. I think I would be a vertebrate paleontologist and maybe publish some papers on the Paleocene crocodiles I dug up when I was working for the Science Museum of Minnesota one summer. Hmm. I think I detect a bit of wistfulness in my response to this one.

If I could be a chef... Ah, you knew I'd answer this one, didn't you? I would do one of two things: I would either run a small pastry shop or I would start a catering company that specialized in small gatherings. I have a friend who's a successful chef and I like to think I'd tackle it a little bit like she has—a few standards, but mostly a different menu every day, depending on what's good and fresh. I wouldn't want people to get any sense of "production line" from what they ate; I'd want them to feel as though they had been invited to a special, intimate dinner at my house.

If I could be a linguist...I would study Basque just because it's so freaking cool. Actually, one of my goals for the next decade of my life is to become fluent in one or more of the foreign languages that I started studying in the past but never got anywhere with. To this end, I have been studying Spanish on the internet. "Es un libro aburrido." "Quien es esa muchacha en la photo?" "Bh...bh...bh..." (That last one is me trying desperately to get my b/v sounds right.)

If I could be an innkeeper...I would want to have a bed and breakfast, and it would probably have way too much in common with the one on Newhart.

If I could be a fashion designer...I would want to apprentice under Olivier Theyskens at Rochas, because he seems to have a lot more fun playing with shapes and textures and historic references than other designers do, yet he still always creates clothes that are very true to the label's heritage. Hopefully I would be a somewhat better patterner and seamstress than I am in reality.

I don't really want to nominate anyone, but please take this and run with it if you like!

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* Am I supposed to answer this one, too? I'm not clear on the rules. Well, if I could be a restaurant critic, I would probably get fired pretty quickly for savaging a restaurant that happened to be an advertiser in the publication I was working for.