24

It’s my birthday again. It comes right on the heels of the major holidays, in the midst of those holidays used for getting lucky (you know that’s true, I mean Valentine’s Day and St. Patrick’s Day? Hello.) My birthday usually gets lumped with Valentine’s Day because of the proximity. I’m just glad I wasn’t born at the end of December because then I’d get the dreaded Christmas/Birthday present combo. People born in a span of time devoid of holidays escape the combo present curse completely.

I share a birthday with Abraham Lincoln, Charles Darwin and, this year at least, Fat Tuesday. Apparently, Joe DiMaggio’s brother was born on Feb. 12 too, who knew.

Since my last birthday I have quit a job, started a new one, moved states, ended three relationships and started two (that sounds like a lot but one of them was this weird on and off bad thing so it wasn’t multiple people. Right now if a psychiatrist asked me to say something that reminds me of that relationship I’d say – hanging chad), got my heart broken, had multiple visitors, attended a wedding, was asked to speak in a wedding and be a maid of honor, made new friends, made new enemies, learned to line dance, started playing soccer and acting again, swam in the ocean at night, saw manatees for the first time and glowing phytoplankton. There’s more, there’s a lot more actually. When I was in college the years between birthdays didn’t seem much different. Everything was working up to your 21^st birthday but beyond that it was a blur of school work, parties and a smattering of activities done sober. You learned more, maybe if you were lucky you learned enough to make changes that would benefit your life. If not, like most of us, things went on the same way. Maybe you learned to eat before drinking, that was an important one. New faces came and went, old ones stuck around or maybe we lost them somehow.

The only birthday in high school that stands out is my 18^th. The only one I was really looking forward to was my 16^th, but I don’t remember anything really exciting happening except that I could say I was 16 (maybe that came from the Sound of Music, I don’t really know.) My parents threw me a party for my 18^th with my friends, all of which didn’t drink (we weren’t hardcore it just wasn’t on our radar, we could act like idiots on our own, no alcohol needed.) We danced like mad to the DJ that was a family friend and eventually it was so hot we had to stick our heads out the window to cool off. It was freezing outside being February in Kansas, which is usually dreary, and full of shallow snow that turns the color of mud as soon as it hits the ground. It isn’t the pretty pure white snow you see in December. I always remember there being slush on the ground around my birthdays when I was in elementary school. Sloshing through the dirty wetness to get to a birthday party where we painted plaster molds to hang on the wall, or painted vases that would eventually be glazed, there was one where we dressed in Victorian dresses and played Victorian games where you won fancy soap as a prize. Those were the days.

The only birthday I remember in college was my 21^st. If the only reason to join a sorority was for your 21^st, that would have made it worth it for me. We met at the Heidelberg, to this day my favorite place to go in Columbia, Mo. Everyone started 21^st birthdays there, everyone could eat, drink or not drink if you were underage. I had a boa, my sisters made me a paddle and shot book (think scrap book but for the shots you are taking that night), ALL of my friends came to at least take a shot with me or just say “hi.” I took 21 shots that night with my friends timing me so I didn’t take too many too close together, I had a rule to not take any shots with multiple kinds of straight liquor (you know, four horsemen, three wise men, whatever.) I ate and drank a ton of water and I survived, no throwing up and I remember everything, I didn’t even get kicked out of a bar, which is a common occurrence on a 21^st birthday. I didn’t have to plan a thing and it was perfect. The Winter Olympics’ opening ceremony was on TV that night, but I don’t remember even being interested. I just remember trying to talk to all my friends and sisters that were there, letting them buy me shots called Scooby snacks or chocolate cake. My friend Bill had the tradition of buying a blowjob shot for everyone on their 21^st. He had made me a Rocky Horror themed shot book page and I remember thinking I was so lucky to have friends around me that knew me so well and being so grateful they had taken the time to plan something for me.

Last year, I spent the eve of my birthday in a hotel room in Virginia Beach with my then-boyfriend. He was on a base there and I flew in for the weekend. We didn’t go to an expensive dinner; he hadn’t planned anything although the hotel was nice. We ended up walking to a 7-Eleven as snow fell; I wasn’t wearing enough clothing by far because I had come from Alabama where I had worn a tank top and jeans onto the plane.  We picked up a pint of ice cream, wine and powdered donuts for the morning. That night we watched Tangled in the hotel room. I ate most of the ice cream and we didn’t finish the wine. I flew out the next day, on my birthday, but I don’t remember anything interesting about that day except that he told me Whitney Houston had died in the morning. I don’t remember what I did when I got back to Montgomery, I know that my apartment was like a refrigerator and I couldn’t find my fish (turns out he had frozen to death over the weekend since I had turned off the heat to save money. I know I’m terrible, but when I left I was wearing a tank top, how was I supposed to know a cold front was going to come through?)

And here I am this year. I’ve been alive for 24 years. Last night, instead of getting wine from a gas station, I made a big meal of jumbalaya, fried pickles and beignets to celebrate Fat Tuesday, listened to country, painted my nails and caught up on my programs. I spent the night alone. Today, instead of taking 24 shots I start rehearsal for a community theater production. My Facebook wall has been blowing up all day with kind words, some very kind and unexpected. It’s unusual for me to comment back to every message, but I appreciate each birthday wish so much I figured I’d show it this year, it doesn’t take much of my time. My friends at work decorated my corner with purple and green streamers (mardi gras, y’all) there are beads all over my desk and my boss got me a tiramisu cake with little peanut butter cakes. She said she thought I needed dainty things for my birthday.

Look how dorky I look. Twenty-four years old and I am just as gawky as ever, the tiramisu is the star of this picture. 

I know I must have wondered on the plane from Virginia where I would be in exactly a year. I know I hadn't considered a desk covered in mardi gras beads. Now, I wonder where I’ll be in a year from now. I guess, judging from this year, I could be anywhere, with anyone, doing anything. And although my year is streaked with depression, low self-esteem and anxiety (and any other problems you can think of associated with major change and some outrageous personal growing pains), I can’t imagine where else I would be right now. I’m afraid to imagine where I might be next year. I can’t imagine another year quite as exhausting as this one, but bring it on. I’m ready for it this time.

I was originally going to make this a post about what I wanted for my birthday, but that was really boring. So... money? Wait, wait, drinks, that’s it, just buy me a drink when we’re out. 

I feel a quarter-life crisis coming on, wait...maybe not

I said something recently that was misconstrued (this actually happens relatively often.) What I said was, “The only good thing about your 20s is being young.” Unfortunately, I said this is in front of a few coworkers that are on the wrong side of 35. They apparently thought I was saying they were old or something. Really I was just trying to say that your 20s are hard. Like, harder than I thought they’d be when I was an angst-filled teenager.

I suppose when I was younger 24 sounded old (I turn 24 in about a month.) Actually, I know it sounded old because when I say it to myself it scares the hell out of me. Funny thing is, I play soccer with people in their 40s and I NEVER think of them as being old. When I think of someone else being 30 I never have images of cakes with gravestones on them and black balloons at birthday parties.

Tell me you get that reference, please. You know when people are getting older and friends give you cakes that say “Over the hill” or something equally “witty.” And there’s a gravestone on your cake and maybe someone gives you a gag walking stick with a mirror and a horn on it. I know that wasn’t just my family. But speaking of my family, my aunt’s 50^th birthday was a year or two ago and her cake was shaped like a toilet and had like blue gelatin in the bowl with a chocolate poop floating in it. The frosting read, “Everything goes to shit after 50” or  “After 50 everything turns to crap” or something equally gross to accompany a pastry.

A coworker recently said she was having a quarter life crisis, which I feel like is pretty typical. I’m not sure there’s a person I know that's gotten through the "torturous twenties" (get it? like terrible twos, but I just made it up...whatever) that really wants to go back.

I mean, in your 20s you look pretty good, gravity hasn’t completely destroyed your appearance, running on very little sleep and crackers for lunch still magically works somehow and drinking a tad more than is necessary is accepted and a reasonable way to deal with stress. That stuff is pretty cool. Figuring out where you want to go in the future profession-wise, relationship-wise and mentally being prepared for what that all means is the opposite of cool. It's also the opposite of fun. 

Also, when you turn 24 that song "What's My Age Again" by blink-182 doesn't apply any more and that just totally sucks.

This is it, but you should really know already. 

I like being able to say I'm in my 20s, I like imagining I have a lot of time left, a lot of options, that I could go anywhere and do anything. If I wanted I could move to the Northwest and live with the hipsters or move to Cali to pursue an acting career (or be an extra or something, BUT STILL.) I could move to the Northeast and break out my black leather jacket and dull colored clothes or I could stay here in endless summer to wear shorts and bright, obnoxious patterns. But then again, you don't have to be in your 20s to do any of these things. If you know what's going to make you happy, that should drive you (I'm saying this because I sometimes feel like I've backed myself into a corner and I don't have any options. This is like a reminder to me and maybe it will like help other people or like you or stuff and junk.) 

I know there's so much time for things to fall together. There's room to make mistakes and to do the right thing. There's always time to start doing what you want to do, it just always seems like time is slipping by, that there's never enough or that you are wasting what time you do have. 

So, I'm going to give you some advice some of my soccer teammates told me today. One said "stop and smell the flowers" but the other said "stop and smell the weeds." He said this because his daughter picks the weeds and puts them in a little vase with water. You know, some weeds are the prettiest plants, I know when you were a kid (if you were a girl) you probably made crowns with those tiny white flowery things that were actually weeds. I mean, hello, everyone put dandelions behind their ears when they were yellow and blew all the little puffy things off of them when they looked like little Epcot globes (and if you didn't make a wish you were doing it wrong.)  And I like thinking about it that way better. We already stop to smell the flowers because they're pretty, they're the easy things to enjoy, but the weeds take a little more work but worth it.

I don't know where all this crunchy talk came from, but it sounds good doesn't it? 

Thankful, grateful, nifty

It’s thankful time again. All week my Facebook timeline has been flooded with optimistic, gratified statuses from friends and Facebook people I knew at one point in my life.

They are mostly all the same, you know the shtick, “I’m thankful for my family, they’re the best. I love them so much.” Or “I’m thankful for a great weekend with the best friends anyone could ever ask for.” Or, “[insert a line about the sun coming out tomorrow Annie-style yada yada]”

I guess it was this Facebook phenomenon that I had never heard of where every day of November you post something you are thankful for.

I think that's a really great idea, honestly, I know it sounds like I'm making fun of it, but it's a good idea in theory. Many of us truly have a TON to be grateful for and proud of. But it’s one of those things that you’re going to post, people are going to “like” it, you’ll feel all warm from the attention and proud of how humble you’re being, then you’ll probably forget about it in 24 hours.

Example (I’m making this up, but I bet you all are going to know what I’m saying here):

Facebook post = “I am thankful for my job. There are so many people out there that aren’t fortunate enough to be working or they’re having a difficult time getting hired. I'm blessed to be in a good place professionally.”

FAST FORWARD 24 hours

Conversation with a coworker = “I am so pissed, I can’t believe no one appreciates my work. Also, come on, who works on the Friday after Thanksgiving? …mumble mumble, slave drivers.”

Don’t get me wrong; I am just as guilty as the next person of this stuff. Who doesn’t come home after a pretty nifty* day at work and immediately become this grumpy bear-animal as if everything bad in the world happened to you. 

I think I actually did that yesterday. 

I'm not sure how to remedy this ridiculousness, but I suppose it could start by legitimately being grateful for the things we have. You know, not just for the day you say it, but for all the time and all the days of all the year. 

It's like how we're supposed to keep the Christmas spirit (charitable, family-fuzzies, goodwill toward men and so on and so forth) all year long. We all know that doesn't happen. We are total Scrooges the majority of the time. So, with Thanksgiving a day away, let's try for TWO days, as opposed to one, to be thankful for, at least, the fact that we're here and able to do and experience stuff.

Thankful to what you might ask? Well, that's up to you. Maybe it's accident, evolution, happenstance, God's will, nature, science, serendipity, chance, destiny or the flying spaghetti monster. Whatevs. You're here and even if we're all just little creatures in a giant being's ant farm, that's something.

Don't I sound optimistic right now? I should join the Optimist club or something (I bet you thought I was making up the Optimist Club. Oh no, my friend, that's real.) Everything is a little "Kumbaya" at the moment and I'm not sure where it came from but I'm rolling with it. 

*For those of you youngins, “nifty” means pretty darn good, in case you were confused. 

The best advice I’ve been given recently

People give advice all the time. In our minds, it’s just us trying to be helpful. We’re making sure that person doesn’t make the same mistake we’ve made. We just don’t want them to get hurt, we’re trying to make them feel better, blah blah blah the list goes on. Either way, we really want to tell people what they should do. 

If you’re like me, you really don’t want to ever make decisions (they could be wrong!) so I am constantly asking people whether I should go to events, what I should order, if I should workout etc. It’s very annoying. I just want people to take the choices away from me. That’s the stupidest thing you’ve ever read, right? That might be the stupidest thing I’ve ever typed, but I didn’t realize how silly wanting to give up my free will was until right this second. 

Still, I am still going to share the best advice I’ve been given recently, because maybe it will benefit you like it did me. Maybe. Maybe not. Whatever, at least I’m putting it out there, just in case. 

An old friend came in town recently to see our mighty alma mater play football in my current home-state (we lost if you were wondering.) We’ve known each other since middle school and somehow managed to go to the same college. We ended up having some of the same circle of friends, and I hadn’t seen him in a a year and a half, I think. He’s one of those people that isn’t afraid to tell me straight up if I’m an idiot and to get my shit together. 

So, after I tell him how I’ve been struggling since moving to Florida, mostly socially, he tells me what I’m about to tell you. 

Don’t let one issue in your life motivate all the rest of your decisions and actions. I was totally focused on one thing that was wrong and everything I did revolved around that. All of my actions were wondering how I could fix my “problem” or what I could do to correct it. I wasn’t even sure if there was a problem. 

See, it’s all very confusing. But the point is, the only thing that should motivate our decisions and actions is to find happiness and to better ourselves. Does that sound selfish? It isn’t, we help others because that brings us happiness and it improves our outlook on life. 

Example:

Once in college I had to be in a couple psych studies (it was for a class, OK?) One of them was one where they make you take this multiple choice test. Then after you’re done this guy comes over to take it from you. My guy knocked over this container of writing utensils when he was giving me my parting instructions, so I helped him pick them up, and he told me when I got back to my room, I was supposed to log onto this website he gave me and there would be more multiple choice questions, and then the study would be over. I walk home, get on the computer, fill out the questions and after I submit them the next page that comes up explains the whole experiment. Apparently, the study was to see the affect of helping others on your mood. The whole clumsiness thing was a ploy so I’d help the guy. In the other test group people were given something, then they were told to fill out the rest of the survey at home. The people that helped others were more upbeat than the ones that were given something for no reason. 

That was a really long explanation of why helping others makes you feel better, but at least it was a scientific explanation...kind of. What I’m saying is, what makes you happy is often what makes others happy, so it’s kind of a win-win for everyone. 

End of advice. 

PS. I try not to give advice because I had this dream once that my friend shot me because I gave him bad advice. So when I do give advice, I usually REALLY believe in it. 

This is Veteran's Day

I don't know if this is normal for other elementary schools, but my kiddie alma mater made Veteran's Day a very large deal. Each class had to learn a different patriotic song. Some of them were about America, different states, what the states were known for and classic Americana songs. One year my grade learned the U.S. Air Force song.

Off we go into the wild blue yonder,
Climbing high into the sun;
Here they come zooming to meet our thunder,
At 'em boys, Give 'er the gun! (Give 'er the gun now!)
Down we dive, spouting our flame from under,
Off with one helluva roar!
We live in fame or go down in flame. Hey!
Nothing'll stop the U.S. Air Force!

Off we go into the wild sky yonder,
Keep the wings level and true;
If you'd live to be a grey-haired wonder
Keep the nose out of the blue! (Out of the blue, boy!)
Flying men, guarding the nation's border,
We'll be there, followed by more!
In echelon we carry on. Hey!
Nothing'll stop the U.S. Air Force!

There are more lyrics, but we only learned two verses. At the time, honestly, I don't even know if I knew what the Air Force did really. I guess I probably would have said, "Fly planes." 

I also remember singing Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy and playing the chords to go with it on the guitar. You know how in elementary school sometimes kids learn to play the recorder (which isn't a real instrument FYI?) Well, my year they decided to not play recorders and to teach us to play chords on the guitar. I remember none of these, but this is the song anyway.

In other news, who wants to dress up like the Andrews Sisters for Halloween with me someday?

Back to Veteran's Day. I respect the military so entirely I can't put it into words correctly. My ex-boyfriend used to get upset before he saw action, because people would thank him for his service when he was in uniform. I used to try to explain, he was a symbol of those other service men and women that can't be thanked. I'm proud of all of my friends and relatives that are serving or have served. I'm proud of anyone that has served honorably, for their sacrifice and their family's, for everything they've given up so that we can be safe. 

I know this has nothing to do with my elementary school. But when I think back, I'm just so glad we had that big assembly.  I remember we could invite our parents and anyone we knew of that had served. I'm pretty sure that assembly is the reason I know the song "Fifty Nifty United States" which is subsequently why I can say all the states in alphabetical order. We may not have picked up on why our patriotic display was important, but we were acknowledging this country. They were teaching us about our nation, whether we knew it or not. 

In middle school, my choir teacher was a complete nut job but, we sang God Bless the USA before every musical and play we performed. It was like our warm-up tradition. The whole cast would stand in a big circle and put their arms around each other, some of us even knew how to harmonize to parts of it. And you know what, it felt really good to be that close to others singing about the United States. And we were so young we didn't even know about party lines, 9/11 had just happened and we were all just holding onto each other. Granted, we lived in Kansas, we were incredibly removed from most of it, but we learned what had happened, we knew it was scary and that we had been attacked. 

Today, I posted about our veterans on Facebook and Twitter (as most of us did) I donated some money this weekend to the disabled veterans group in the area and gave blood (DISCLAIMER: I am not trying to humble brag) I'm trying to say there's so much more we could be doing. I supposed we could start by becoming a more unified nation. There are states that have petitions to secede from the U.S. right now. People want to boycott American businesses (see my last post) and we're defriending people because of their vehement political views. Just, put it away. There are more important things. The division is only making things worse... I'll get off the soap box now. 

This clip is my favorite America medley ever. It's from the movie With a Song in My Heart, and it's wonderful. 

PS. It's all of this election fallout that's making me so rant-y. I promise I'll stop. 

The Post-Election Blues

I knew this was going to happen, but it doesn’t make it any better. I knew the losers of the election would write terrible, hate-filled posts and the winners would celebrate how much better life is going to be all over social media.  It wouldn’t matter who won or lost, this was going to happen either way.

If all the political sludge upsets you today, whether you won or lost, I’m going to write a list of things that are positive. Also, for the record, if you are still upset today, I assume you didn’t make the cookie recipe I suggested yesterday. You should have, I’m just saying.

1.     The world hasn’t been destroyed by an enormous asteroid. I’m pretty jazzed that last night while I slept I didn’t go the way of the dinosaur.

2.     A nuclear war didn’t erupt wiping out most of our major cities and polluting our food supply. Because I don’t have arms growing from my shoulder blades from radiation, I’m in an upbeat mood.

3.     Anarchy hasn’t consumed towns and cities in our great nation. I haven’t seen any evidence personally of looting and graffiti in places where looting and graffiti don’t already happen. Because I haven’t seen a single Molotov cocktail today, I am a happy camper.

4.     Aliens have decided that today is not the day they are going to take over our planet. When that day comes, I assume it will be a lot like the movie Mars Attacks! That isn’t the case today, which is something to rejoice about.

5.     I still have all my fingers and toes and the ability to move my limbs. I could have woken up at the hands of some crazy serial killer, psychopath a la Saw or Hostile. You didn’t wake up limb-less either. See? That’s a good thing. 

6.     Did you know there’s a caldera in Yellow Stone National Park? That’s like a massive super volcano-type thing for those of you that didn’t have to take a whole class in college about Yellow Stone (true story.) It’s just hanging out there below the surface, until it just gets so bored that it’s going to be like, “Well, guess it’s about time to wipe out this continent, that’ll be exciting.” And then we are all going to suffocate, probably. That didn’t happen, so yay!

7.     Is the zombie apocalypse upon us? I haven’t seen the undead wandering around today. I know I haven’t seen anyone eating another person’s face. That’s a win on the life scoreboard I feel like.

8.     Was the ability to voice your hateful or joyous opinion stripped away? It wasn’t? You’re allowed to post pictures of crying bald eagles, unflattering gifs, unintelligent rants about the amendments that were passed or not and insensitive comments about the losers or winners of the race. There we go. You are doing better than some people in nations across the world.

Does that make you feel better? If it doesn’t, reevaluate your life and get back to me. I’m telling you though, those cookies are miracle workers. 

MAKE THESE! What are you waiting for? If you don't like them ... you're un-American, there I said it.