Reverb 10: Beautifully Different

December 8 Beautifully Different

Think about what makes you different and what you do that lights people up. Reflect on all the things that make you different - you'll find they're what make you beautiful.

I am beautiful. I admit it. Heh.

There are a lot of things that make me different from most people. How about a list?

1. I'm freaking nuts, you guys. Most people aren't (or at least they haven't been diagnosed...), so I am different. This is usually a bad thing, but medication is magic, so it's all good (most of the time). There is some good that comes from this, though. I have to keep a close eye on my moods, and why I'm feeling the way I'm feeling. I have to work hard to make sure this illness doesn't screw with my marriage (or any number of other things in my life), so I am very careful with my words and I consider carefully what the things I say will really say to other people. I'm not perfect about this, of course; everyone loses it once in a while and I am no exception (and anyone who says he/she never loses control is LYING) (unless it's Jesus). But I think that having to think carefully about the things I say helps me be more considerate and helps me communicate more effectively.

2. I get along way better with men than women. I have a few close girlfriends, but the vast majority of my good friends over the years have been dudes. Guys just make more sense to me. They aren't catty and most of the time they say what they mean, they don't overthink things or play games, and they don't gossip as much (not all women do this, of course, it's just a generalization). This has been frustrating in the past; when I was in high school and I wasn't allowed to date until I was 16, I couldn't hang out with my friends because it would be a "date", even though I had no romantic feelings for my guy friends. Mim and I fought about this one a lot. Fun times. Also, in college, before I dated Scott, I was totally in love with my best friend, and OH BOY did that complicate things.

3. How many women do YOU know who are chemists?

4. I am apparently the only person on the planet who doesn't want babies. Ok, I suppose that's a slight exaggeration...I can think of...two other people who don't want kids, and one of them is married to me. I would be totally willing to donate my eggs to help other people have babies, but they won't take them because of #1 (I'm crazy).

5. Something different I do that lights people up...? I really like sharing what I have with other people (unless it's yarn; I'm a total Yarn Scrooge), but I don't think that's that different.

I can't think of anything else. And I don't see how these make me beautiful, but Scott and my mommy think I'm pretty so I suppose that's all that matters.

Now I'll Go Churn Some Butter...

Apparently, housewives are extinct.

An acquaintance posted this link of Facebook a little while ago. I read it, and thought it was fine and had a bit of a point, though it reeked of 19th century gender roles.

Then I read the comments.

Holy hell, people!

It took me three days to cool down enough to write this while keeping the language clean. Well, cleanish.

Gee, I'm SO SORRY I was too busy studying quantum mechanics to learn how to make a perfect souffle. Apparently I'm an awful person.

There are women who are happy to be at home, to cook and clean, and take care of children, and be there when the husband comes home with a smile and a fresh, hot supper laid out on the table. And I think that's wonderful. I think women should be able to do whatever they want to do, whether that is being at home or being out on Wall Street, trading stocks. Mim was a stay-at-home mom, and it was so wonderful to know that she was always there and would help and support us in all our endeavors. But she always wanted more. She wanted to learn. She wanted to (someday) be able to go out into the world and do something else after we kids were raised and do something she really, truly enjoyed.

I have no desire to have children of my own. I also have no desire to quit my job, stay at home, and cook. I don't particularly like cooking (but maybe when I have a nice, new, big kitchen I'll be willing to learn...) and I don't want to do all the cleaning (although I would clean more around the house if someone would remind me to, hint hint). I'm just not the domestic type. And I have thought to myself, many times, "Thank GOD I was born when I was, because I don't think I could ever be happy in a fixed gender role like things used to be!"

(And, no, I didn't just take the Lord's name in vain, because I really DO thank Him)

(So nobody get offended, ok?)

I don't consider myself a "feminist", but I'm really happy that I found a man who didn't have...ideas...about how things should be run in our home. We're partners. We share. We help each other. We pick up each other's slack. And we split the work (not quite evenly, I must admit...he's so much better at remembering chores than I am!). We both go to our jobs and earn about the same amount of money. And all of this is totally fine with both of us. We're happy.

There seem to be a lot of men (at least, all the men who left comments on this article...) that think that just because they were born with man-parts they are entitled to having a woman who will do whatever he wants her to do.

Think again, jerks.

The Universe Wins Again

Singing has always been something I enjoyed immensely. I remember when I was very very small I had all the musical movies I watched memorized (The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, etc.) and I would sit around and play with toys and sing to myself. There even came a time when I wouldn't stop singing music from The Nightmare Before Christmas and it was driving Mim so crazy that she told me I wasn't allowed to sing that music anymore.

Mim has played the piano since she was very young, and when I was old enough she started teaching me to play. I hated it. HATED. I just always felt like there were better uses for my time, and why should I learn this because it will never help me in the real world or anything-basically any little kid's thoughts when they're made to practice something over and over again.

Eventually I quit (Mim wasn't happy about that) and now that I'm grown I regret quitting terribly. I can still read music, albeit very slowly, and I still have a few sonatinas memorized, but other than that I really can't play anymore. But music didn't disappear from my life.

In 7th grade I took my first choir class and from the very beginning I was hooked. I continued to take choir until my senior year in high school, when I didn't participate. I joined the Jazz choir junior year (as an alto, strangely enough)(I usually sing high soprano)(apparently if I sing low I sound sultry and jazzish) and senior year I did a song for the homecoming week talent show ("Winter" by Tori Amos).

In my high school there were basically three levels of choir classes: open choir, Warrior Chorus, and Concert Choir. The last two required an audition, but the first was open to anyone who wished to enroll. So freshman and sophomore years I was in open choir, and junior year I auditioned to be in Warrior Chorus and made it in, and when senior year rolled around I auditioned for Concert Choir. I didn't make it in. I should have. In junior year we had a Christmas concert and I had gotten a solo, beating out all the Concert Choir sopranos who auditioned. When it came time for the concert, I (somehow) got hand, foot, and mouth disease, and was forced to stay home and give up my solo to someone else. Universe: 1, Anna: 0. Either way, it was clear to everyone that I should have made it into Concert Choir. I think the director must have had something against me (and I don't want you to think I'm just saying that to make myself look better or anything, it's just truly what happened).

When they posted the lists of who got in to which choir, and my name wasn't on there, many many people were outraged. When senior year started I went to the director (who was new; the old one got fired for BIG TIME extortion) and asked to re-audition and he refused, so I decided that the drama wasn't worth it, and I didn't want to settle for being in Warrior Chorus again, so I quit. That was it. I'd had it. So senior year I didn't sing in a choir at all. Universe: 2, Anna: 0.

Then I went to college, and immediately signed up to audition for the many choirs there. And you know what? Auditions were right before the semester started and Utah has a very high elevation compared to South Dakota, and guess who got altitude sickness and couldn't sing? Yep. Universe: 3, Anna: 0.

So, I did the next best thing: I signed up for a small group vocal music class, and I loved it. It was nice because I got a lot of personal instruction from the grad student who was teaching the class (because the class was so small) and I improved my classical technique, determined to try again next year. I then spent the following summer taking private voice lessons back in Sioux Falls. I was ready to audition, and when I got to campus in the fall I went to sign up for auditions. BUT, every single choir was scheduled to meet for practice at the exact times I was in a chemistry (and therefore necessary) class, so even if I did get into a choir I wouldn't be able to come to practice unless I gave up chemistry. Universe: 4, Anna: 0.

I love singing. I always have. And I tried for eight years to make it work. But it just isn't meant to be. I got the message, Universe. You win. You freaking win.

I hope you're happy.

Labor Day Weekend

This past weekend was long because of Labor Day. Hooray for pointless holidays!

Scott had scheduled his (late) birthday LAN party, so Friday after work I stopped by the store and got treats, then came home and helped clean up the house a bit. It wasn't much of a job, since we usually keep things pretty tidy anyway. Our only consistent messes are on the coffee table and the kitchen table, and those didn't take long. He and his friends played from Friday night to Monday night. I don't know how he does it; my eyes get tired enough staring at a computer screen for a few hours.

I tried to arrange something fun with Kwiddens for Friday night but nobody could babysit Nyah and Nyah was sick of the car seat, since they just taken a road trip down to Arkansas to visit our grandparents. It was so sad; Nyah only had to look at her car seat to make her start crying. So I had Friday night to myself, and I just snuggled up on the couch and read "The Hobbit", one of my favorite books.

Saturday morning I got some exercise in, the came home and showered and did a little grocery shopping. Then at 3:00 some friends and I had planned a Lecture Prep reunion at Bicentennial Park in Provo. It was me, Kirk and Angie, Nate, Sarah and her boyfriend Nate and one other guy who worked there after I had already graduated whose name escapes me at the moment. We grilled and had the most amazing sweet corn and talked for 2.5 hours, sharing stories about work and remembering some of the funny things that had happened, and talking about how the Chemistry Department has changed, etc. It was just so nice to see everyone, but it made me miss working there more than ever. Oh well. I have a great job now, too.

Since I was in Provo anyway, I then drove down to Mim's house and met up with her and Em and Jorg and we all went to dinner at The Pizza Factory. After that we were talking about movies and shows we like, and Jorg suggested that some time we should get together and have a Stargate marathon, since he had never seen it. We decided to do it this weekend, since I had work off on Monday, so after dinner I drove Em and Jorg back up to my house. We watched Stargate and ate yummies and talked and it was really fun. They stayed over two nights, and Mim came to get them Monday morning. At one point Sunday night Jorg started to get sick of Stargate, so we played Phase 10 and then went to dinner at Applebee's, which ended up being a little disappointing foodwise, but the company was great. When we got back Jorg went downstairs and played Starcraft 2 with Scott and Jon. Em and I decided it was a good opportunity for chick flicking, so we watched "Moulin Rouge" and "27 Dresses". Jorg came upstairs to grab a drink and asked what Moulin Rouge was about, and I said "um...prostitutes..." and he gave me a funny look and went back downstairs. It was amusing.

Monday after Em and Jorg were gone Jon, Scott and I went and had lunch at MacCool's and then we tackled the downstairs storage room so we could clear it out because LI IS COMING TOMORROW! I'm super excited about that. We're going to have so much fun! We also went to the dollar store to get some candles and the Halloween stuff was out and there were more tombstones for our graveyard for only a dollar each (of course, it's the dollar store), so this year our graveyard will be much better. I love Halloween.

So that was my Labor Day weekend. And now I don't get another day off until Thanksgiving.

Except the few days I'll be taking off for when Li is here.

What If...?

A few posts ago I asked what I should write about, and Scott asked:

"If you were not married how do you think your life would differ from how it is now?"

It made me start thinking about my life's path...

I'm happy where I am. Interestingly enough, though, if several years ago, like at the beginning of college, I had been able to see into the future, to see what my life is now, I don't think I would have thought it was going in the right direction, that is, the direction that would make me happiest.

My freshman year one of my chemistry professors had us all write down some goals we had for his class, the year, college, and life in general. I was only half joking when I said, "Graduate from BYU without getting married!" For those of you that aren't in the know, BYU's students tend to get married a lot more than students at other campuses. My thoughts? They really, really want to move past making out, and they're not allowed to unless they're married (not only will they get kicked out of BYU, but they'll go to hell as well). Just a theory.* Anyway, having observed nothing but bad marriages my whole life, I didn't want any part of it. Why would I want to bind myself to someone, just to have them ruin my life? And why would I want to marry someone just to make babies? I just didn't want it. So I dated, because dating's fun, and let's face it, so is making out.

I never thought I would meet someone like Scott. I never even thought someone like Scott could exist. The dating pool at BYU seemed severely limited. I found guys who were good people but had different ideas and values than I did, but nobody was ever good enough. Everyone was too...vanilla. I tried dating a lot of people, but it just didn't stick. It didn't help that guys generally don't like to date girls who are smarter than they are, so a lot of the guys who I would have liked to date weren't even remotely interested in me if they knew that I was a chemistry major.

So marriage wasn't even in my plans.

Academically, I was never quite sure where I would go. My plan was basically to get my degree, and sometime my senior year decide whether I wanted to go to grad school, medical school, or just find a job. Two things basically made this decision for me: figuring out I was bipolar and falling in love with Scott. Figuring out I was bipolar, and FINALLY understanding why I was so sick all the time, made me realize that further schooling just wasn't wise unless it were the only thing I were doing. It wouldn't have been the only thing, either, because I wanted to be with Scott, and I didn't want to half-ass my marriage. I wanted to be there 100%, and I knew that if I continued school, things would just get too busy for us to be working on our marriage constantly, like we are now. It looks like that turned out pretty well, don't you think?

So...back to the original question. If I weren't married, I probably wouldn't have met anyone that I could have married, so I would have continued school. If I had chosen grad school, I probably would have tried to stay at BYU, since I absolutely adored the chemistry department there. I loved the classes, the professors, my jobs, just everything about that building made me feel more like myself than any other place I had been before. If I had stayed there, I would have had to keep going to church to stay enrolled...I'm honestly not sure how that would have gone. For all I know I might have just decided it wasn't worth it and transferred to another university. In that case, it would probably have been a college somewhere in the midwest, since that still felt like home at the time.

If I had chosen medical school, I have absolutely no idea where I would have gone or what I would have specialized in, but I would still be there today, and so I would probably be too busy to do much of anything else.

Either way, I would still be in school.

My life is now something I never thought it would be, but let me tell you, this marriage thing is awesome.

As long as you have the right person.

Which I do.



*Just FYI, I have nothing but respect for the students at BYU who actually follow the Honor Code. I certainly didn't.

Chemistry Can Also Be Ridiculous

And, some more!

• 10:15 am Saturday: My reaction tipped over :(! Nooooo...
• I rotovaped (is that a word?)
• I added bromine to phenol in DMSO. What a smelly mess. I am sick of all of it. Solid into NMR tube (maybe it worked)...nope.
• Mixture #6 smells like dead cats
• I QUIT the column. I have a better idea!
• Solid unknown is water soluble! Yay! It's also basic to pH paper...ooh.
• Smells nice.
• Smells terrible.
• WOW. This is harder than it looks, let me tell you.
• One last conclusion: Vigreux columns are expensive. Don't break one.
• Refraction=really cool
• Title: Nasty Dynamics Lab
• Eight a.m....yuck.
• File names: "StrongBadIsAwesome", StrongSad", "AnnaSilly", "ErikTheWeird", "LifeIsSilly", "SweaterSong", TenOnEverything", "KirkTheJerk"
• Starting some crap over again
• Refocused MUCH BETTER NOT GARBAGE

So, anyway...this is probably why I am not a research chemist. I am incapable of being serious.

Chemistry Can Be Funny

I was looking through some old lab notebooks from college, and I was noticing that I logged my experiments with...flair. I thought it would be amusing to share with you some of the gems I wrote in there! Keep in mind that this is exactly like I wrote it originally in the lab books...smiley faces, exclamation points, and all.

• My percent yield is going to be dismal. A few crystals are forming, but for the most part it isn't working out so well. Nothing came out when I hirsched it! :( Starting over...
• The reaction mixture is a nice color this time.
• I removed the aqueous layer. For some reason this layer was on the bottom...weird.
• I keep washing and washing and washing with methylene chloride...
• I have product! Plenty of product!
• I know my product was pretty darn pure because my melting point was great!
• It looked white. Really white.
• Meso-stilbene dibromide! :)
• Lo and behold, it decomposed!
• It looked pure. No weird colors, etc. The end!
• 0.023 g product. DISMAL.
• (A messed up reaction mechanism) This is what I get for writing in pen...The REAL one: (the right reaction mechanism) I win!
• My alternate procedure yielded brown junk. I suspect failure...
• I made diphenylacetylene! Here's how I know:...It tastes like diphenylacetylene (just kidding!)
• I could have recrystallized it, but I am lazy.

I'll post more later!

200

Well, this is my 200th post.When I started this blog I was only posting a few things a month, and it was just about things that happened every now and then, and it's come very far from that. I talk about more than just my day-to-day life; I talk about my feelings and my struggles with food, exercise, and my weight. I talk about the things I make (though I haven't made much lately because I'm SO FREAKING ADDICTED to Plants vs. Zombies). I talk about things that scare or worry me. I talk about my family. I bring up a few old memories, of things good and bad. It's just MY space, and I feel more and more that I can do whatever I want here. There are a few things I probably won't talk about, since I'm trying to keep this at a PG or PG-13 level, but for the most part I'm becoming more open.

My favorite part of all this is the friends I've made out there in the internet. I love this little community that we've all worked so hard to build. I feel as if, just maybe, I'm finally contributing to it in a meaningful way. It's also a good way to keep in touch with old friends and family members. I love that Kwiddens reads this, and I wish I could get Mim to read it, but she's so freaking busy...oh well.

I'd like to think that my writing is getting better as well. Maybe. In high school I took AP English and Literature classes, testing out of freshman English and Composition classes in college, so except for the occasional paper here and there in my generals, I haven't written properly since high school. I know this doesn't count as writing properly, like writing research papers and essays, but I think that this is a good exercise in learning to describe my world more accurately, and more colorfully, and that's worth something.

I had journals when I was little, but I stopped writing in them because Kwiddens would read them and then make fun of me for something I had written, and back then I couldn't handle that. It's really a shame because I know there are a lot of things that I wish I had written down back when they were fresh in my mind. I started keeping a journal on my laptop freshman year of college, and I had a blog then as well, but Mim and I had a huge fight over something I had said on my blog (I told the world she was crazy, and it was true, but she hadn't come to terms with it or gotten medication yet so that didn't go over too well), so I threw a hissy fit and deleted it (yay, maturity) (I was 17) (I can't believe how dumb I was when I was 17) (or even 18), and of course I wish I hadn't because that was almost an entire year of my thoughts, just gone. As for the journal I kept on my laptop, an ex-boyfriend hacked into it and read all of it behind my back...that relationship didn't end well. Soon after that my laptop was stolen so it was all gone anyway, and someone, somewhere, knows all my secrets. Awesome.

Anyway, that's a roundabout way of saying that this is something I've done before, but I think now I'm finally doing it right. I do censor myself a little, but it's not because I'm afraid someone or other will stumble across this blog and find out that I hate them anymore. Now, it's because there are people I care about that do read this and I would love for them to continue reading this unoffended.

I really feel now that this is my space. Mine. I can say whatever I want here, and I know that the people that read this either know me personally and love me no matter what (because I'm super awesome) (or something) or they don't know me personally and live far far away and if I say something that they don't want to read they can just stop reading. Everyone wins. I think I've come a long way from where I started...two years ago there's no way in hell I would have told anyone I was bipolar, but I've changed so much.

That's something else I enjoy about blogging. I can go backward in time and see what I wrote months, or even years, ago, and see how things have progressed. I can go back and reminisce about the way things were once upon a time, and that's why I sincerely regret that I stopped journaling and blogging before.

But I'm fixing that, as much as it can be fixed, anyway.

Anyway, I love blogging, and I love my bloggy friends, and that's about it. Now let's see how long it takes me to get to 300.

Missing School

Often at work, or when people ask me a chemistry question, I realize how much I've forgotten and how much I never knew in the first place. That's the problem with getting a degree; the more you learn the dumber you feel as you find out about more and more that you don't have a clue about. Awesome.

I often get the urge to review my chemistry just to keep it fresh in my mind, and I've never really acted on that urge because I didn't have many of my books from college. It's one of the only things I regret from my college years: selling back my chemistry books. Now, I realize that this was necessary in order to afford the books for the next semester, but I wish I would have found another way, because now I don't have them and I miss them terribly.

But the other day, I was itching to review some chemistry, and I remembered that I am The Queen Of Internet Shopping, and I decided to see if I could find my old books online. I made myself a list of the chemistry courses I had taken (I still remember each course and its course number, yes that's sad) and went down the list, searching online for the book I had for each course. This wasn't easy as I had forgotten which books I had in the first place, so I spent a few hours doing this. But I did it!

The next step was finding the books for sale online. This is why I am in love with Amazon.com. I found all of my books. All of them. The best part? Three of them were under $10 (including shipping) in very good condition from sellers of used books. I went home and checked to see what books I still had, and I had several still, and a few that I didn't have I had some good replacements for (due to inheriting all the books in an old professor's office one time), so I only needed to actually buy five books. So I'm keeping a close eye on Amazon to see if the other two books come down in price. Even if they don't, I will be able to get them for about $20 each, which isn't bad considering they were originally hundreds of dollars. Let me tell you, upper level chemistry books are some of the most expensive textbooks out there.

So I started with my general chemistry book, which I still had. When I was in college I was so busy that I pretty much learned what was going to be on the exams, and there were bits and pieces that I missed because I was strapped for time. This time around, I have all the time in the world, so I am reading each chapter slowly, highlighting and practicing the chapter exercises. I'm in nerd heaven. I remember now why I chose this as my major: it's very interesting, and there are numbers involved, and I love math and I love knowing how things work and interesting applications of different chemical processes.

So the plan is to go through and review, class by class, until I feel I have fully refreshed my memory, and even learned more than I did in the first place.

Now. This has brought all sorts of good memories to the front of my mind, and I am remembering how much I loved school. I've always loved school, since the very first day of kindergarten. Yes, there were times when I was stressed, but I love learning. I love the smell of books, I love buying new school supplies, I love sitting in class and listening and debating and asking questions, I love sitting and doing homework (believe it or not), and I love taking tests, because they are challenges and it's very gratifying to get good scores, which I almost always did (because of loving school so much).

All of this made me want so very badly to go back to grad school.

But one of the things I've realized about myself is that I can't be in school full time and be healthy at the same time. It's too much. I don't handle stress well, and if I don't sleep enough it throws my brain chemicals (and my whole body) into utter chaos. I thought about doing a master's with night classes, just part time, but chemistry is one of the few disciplines that can't really be done at night. There just isn't enough demand for chemistry classes to extend them to night school.

I wouldn't want to quit my job, either. I love my job. It's amazing. It's such a perfect match to me and my needs. Getting a master's would involve time-consuming research, and I would probably have to quit to be able to devote enough time to it.

The other thing to consider is that I wouldn't know where to go. BYU's chemistry department was AMAZING in resources, classes offered, and staff. I loved it there. I didn't like BYU in general, but the chemistry department was always wonderful to me. So, naturally I would want to go there for grad school. However, not only is it an hour and a half drive from my house if there's no traffic, but I couldn't get back in to save my life, since I've become a heathen.

So, my other options would be to go to the U of U or Weber State, which are closer to my house, but not close enough to be convenient, and I don't honestly know much about either chemistry department, except that the U of U was the place where that cold fusion thing took place years and years ago, which didn't make them look too good.

So, basically, it won't happen. It can't happen. And I need to be ok with that.

So I think what I will do is to keep reviewing my books, and then branch out. I learn extremely well from books, and if there's anything I don't understand I can always internet. The internet knows everything; you just have to know how to sort through the garbage to get to the real stuff.

Emotions...So Complicated

When I was growing up and my life was a living hell and I hadn't found the proper medication (or the proper psychotherapist, for that matter) I had to come up with some way to cope with all the crap and the only way I could was to shut out as much emotion as possible and just try to feel numb. For the most part, it worked. I studied a lot, which ended up being a very good thing, and kept me hidden away in my room most of the time I was at home, and I had friends, but I think I didn't know how much they meant to me until we were thousands of miles apart.

Now that I'm properly medicated I have the ability to feel emotions like "normal" people do. Antidepressants (and mood stabilizers, and antipsychotics, oh my) aren't "happy pills"; they simply give me the ability to feel happy when it is appropriate. While this is a beautiful, beautiful thing, these magical little pills also give me the ability to feel immensely sad at times, but about things that I should feel sad about.

So lately I've been a little bored, mostly just because I've been working fewer hours and am less motivated to work on the blanket (which is coming along beautifully, by the way, I'm just feeling quite blah about everything) and so I have more time to think and hang out on Facebook.

And lately what I've been noticing is that I feel immensely sad when I think about the friends I had back in South Dakota and how much I miss them, and even more sad when I think about how I'm stuck here in Utah and will probably never see most of them again.

I had one friend, Jacee, who was in the theater department with me and we had so much fun all the time having sleepovers, renting movies, going on bike rides, etc. My boyfriend and I went to the prom with her and her boyfriend. We were together the night of the senior class party and all the times we went to that nasty old pancake house on 10th Street.

Another friend I had was Cali, who was and always will be the most beautiful person I have ever known. She introduced me to so much amazing music, and she always let me be myself when I was with her. We had so many inside jokes, and we knew all about each other's pasts and heartaches. We even had a notebook (that I found the other day...forgot I still had it) in which we wrote our "Complaint of the Day" every day in lit class.

There was Shelby, who has always been an inspiration to me. She lives every day to its fullest..."No Day But Today" was plastered on the top of her mortarboard the day we graduated high school. She has always been a good person to talk to, to bounce ideas off of, to cry or complain to, because she loves listening and truly cares.

I had a lot of friends like this in college as well, and it's always the same story...we grow up and move on and try to keep in touch but life gets busy and it's never the same again.

I am so incredibly sad about this.

And the heartbreaking part is, I don't have very many people like this in my life any more. And I don't know where to find them, now that I'm out of school, and that makes me feel kinda...pathetic. Like, I've turned into this lonely person and now that I can actually feel emotions and have lasting relationships all the relationships I had before are all but gone.

Isn't life awesome?

Luck?

For the most part I would not consider myself lucky. Everything I have has come from good decisions and smart planning at some point in my life.

I have a great husband because I took a long time to date and get to know him before I really committed. I dated many men of all types before meeting him so I would find out about myself: what I admired in a man, what wasn't really that important, and what I wanted a relationship to be like. I chose from the very beginning to not make the same mistakes my parents made (no offense, Mim) and to communicate about everything (and I mean everything, even if it's embarrassing) with Scott. I chose to focus on what's important and make sure I didn't have unrealistic expectations about what marriage would be like. I chose to do whatever it takes to make this marriage the best I've ever seen, no matter how difficult it got.

I have plenty of money because I went to college, got a challenging and (somewhat) useful degree so I could get a very good job, which I've kept because I chose to give it my all, and also because I worked so hard in high school so I could get a scholarship, and worked at least one job at all times through college so I have no debt. Scott and I decided to be careful and responsible with our money so we can afford to live the lifestyle we want, so we were able to buy one car half with cash, half on credit, and the other totally in cash. We have since paid off the first car, so the only debt we have at all is the mortgage. It helps that we decided not to have children, because let's face it: dogs are cheaper.

I have an amazing house and awesome renovation plans because Scott and I decided to take the leap into homeownership at the perfect time in relation to the housing market. We have such awesome plans and the means to put them into place because we are going to do most of the work ourselves, and because we got the tax credit for buying a house.

I have an amazingly smart and adorable and sweet dog that fits into our family perfectly because Scott and I wanted to rescue him, and he was just so freaking adorable that as soon as we saw him we knew he was ours.

I have a good relationship with (most of) my family because I chose to move on and give people a second chance. The only person I have no relationship with is the one person who doesn't even want a relationship with me, and I have finally realized that this is totally beyond my control. I can never forget about the crap I went through growing up and during the first few years I was married (the crap had nothing to do with Scott, but everything to do with my screwed up family), but I choose to ignore it, forgive, and focus on the future. One of the best decisions I ever made was to try to have a relationship with Mim again.

I have my sanity because I chose to take care of myself and see a psychiatrist. I also saw a therapist for a while to help me get past my past and my hang-ups. I have my sanity because I have finally recognized my limitations and learned about myself on such a deeper level. I now understand how my mind works and how I can deal with it to make my life as normal as possible. I choose to think of my condition as a challenge, not a handicap.

I have lost weight because I took charge of my life and my health and worked DAMN hard to get the weight off. hCG was hands down the hardest thing I have ever done, and it was also worth it for so many reasons. I lost so much weight and made a giant step toward breaking some very deeply ingrained food addictions. I learned portion control and how to make healthier lifestyle choices. And I look better, too. (FYI, I'm back on the diet to get the last 20 pounds off. I did so well maintaining my weight after the last round, and this time around the cravings aren't so intense. They're also different. Last time I was craving Krispy Kremes, and this time around I am craving salad.)

So I don't consider myself lucky, even though I have such an amazing life right now (knock on wood...). I have worked so hard physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually to get where I am today.

But last night I was so so SO lucky.

Because there was a drunk kid going down our street at about midnight slashing everyone's tires on every car that wasn't in a garage for no apparent reason.

And he skipped ours.

(The cops caught him, don't worry)

LUCKY.

Also, the weather seems to have gotten its act together.

Silly Rabbit...

So I was at work today, bored, making a sock (as usual), and I started thinking.

I made myself Chef Boyardee ravioli for lunch. I love the stuff. And Pop-Tarts. And Lunchables. And Kool-Aid. I love kid food!

I was wondering why, and I think I realized that the things I love eating are based in childhood experiences. When I was growing up my family was so dirt poor that sometimes Mim went without food to make sure Kwiddens and I ate. Really freaking poor. We lived on beans and rice and the cheapest canned vegetables and fruits. We never had cereal for breakfast because it was too expensive, so we ate oatmeal or Malt-O-Meal or grits (yummy!) or cracked wheat (and whoever invented that, THANKS A LOT THAT WAS NASTY AND MIM MADE ME EAT IT ALL).

All that is a long way of saying we rarely ever got kid food. I got it occasionally over at friends' houses, but at home, not so much.

So, once I grew up and had control over my finances and eating habits, I fell in love with the foods I could never have growing up. During my senior year of college I was too busy to bother cooking, so I almost always ate on campus, and that meant from the vending machines in the basement of the chemistry building (since going to the food court would involve actually walking over there...). I was usually pretty reasonable and ate a ham sandwich and an apple, but I have to admit that my favorite meal was (and I kid you not) BYU Cookies 'n' Cream flavored milk and Hostess mini chocolate donuts. And I was skinnier than I am now. Go figure.

(I'm not actually proud of the way I ate, just so you know)