(no subject)

I took a couple days off of work (in April, a terrible time to take off work), which I’m trying to do throughout the year. I’ve scheduled a couple of days off every six weeks and then I’ll take a full week in July. I never taken time off consistently before, which has been fine in the past, but last year it wasn’t fine anymore. I was really burnt out and the time I did take off, I spent traveling. I like traveling but I feel like I’ve really needed time to just be, too. This weekend, I did some things, like visit our zoo and a bit of shopping and out of lunch a couple of times, but mostly it was for being at home. Doing home stuff. Like my taxes and cleaning out my closet.

Yesterday (Sunday), I sat quietly cross-stitching with no music or tv. Just my thoughts. It’s been a long time since I was just quiet with my thoughts. I’ve had these waves of nostalgia recently, since the weather started to warm up, really. I’m the type of person who thinks about my past a lot, actually, which is not always a good thing. I think it’s just a symptom of my age, maybe? I’ve really been examining my job and thinking about my future, which I suppose has left me open to thoughts about the past as well.

Remember that move Peggy Sue Got Married No? Just me? I started to think about eighth grade, of all things: the classes I took, my bedroom, the town where I lived, what I did on the weekends. I thought about, if I could go back, what five things would I want to remember about now. So weird. I would tell myself to:

01) “Save money and don’t waste it on stuff.” My dad owned a business and would pay me a ridiculous amount to clean on Saturdays. This was the 80s when people would sit around and smoke inside so the glass and mirrors were always grimy. I babysat, too. And got a small allowance. And my grandparents would pay me to clean for them or work in the garden. I had, essentially, a small fortune for the time and my age. I bought stickers. And dimestore books. And music—records and tapes (that really hasn’t changed). And magazines (Tiger Beat, and YM, and 16.) I loved magazines so much. I don’t have any of that stuff anymore. I wish I had saved the money to…I don’t know. Do other stuff. Have a nice bank account back when savings actually earned interest and use to fund the college of my choice instead of the college I could afford.

02) “Focus on learning.” I was a good student, actually, but it came easy to me so I didn’t excel, if that makes sense. In the 9th grade, I really waged a campaign to try to convince my (divorced) parents to send me to a really good Catholic private school in the Ohio city where I grew up. My dad wasn’t willing to pay and my mom opted to move us to the South instead. It was traumatic and I didn’t really try too much after that because no one made me. My grades were still good but I didn’t try for AP courses, I decided I “couldn’t” do math or science, which I eventually majored in during college, and I took the easy road wherever possible—psychology taught by the tennis coach, typing (actually, I’m not sad about that), level one of multiple languages but never the harder classes. I ended up at a local college and then dropping out and then coming back but…I don’t know. Rudderless. I don’t think I would have any different luck convincing my parents to shell out for an expensive private school but I wish I would have tried my best. Learned to study. Spent less time playing Mario Bros and being an overly dramatic harridan (even at 16)(especially at 16).

03) “Like what you like.” Through my teens and 20s I was easily persuaded. I’ve been to NASCAR races and I’ve line danced. I’ve watched horror movies and pretended to be really into hair bands and NIN. Pretended to have School! Spirit! Worked on the yearbook committee. Drank to get drunk. Had sex before I was ready. I didn't like any of those things. I stopped playing guitar, hid the fact that I read a lot and had a large vocabulary. Secretly studied art and read poetry. I wanted to fit in, which…I was a teenager, it’s kinda what they do but that was my 20s, too. It wasn’t until my 30s and the internet came along that I started to just like what I like but even today I find I filter myself. It's the eternal worry: what if someone things I'm weird. (Someone is always going to think I'm weird. It's totally okay.)

04) “Give up caffeine and be a happier person.” Caffeine triggers my anxiety. I’m not allergic but I’m so sensitive to it. I can remember nights lying awake in my bed, heart pounding, trying to convince myself I wasn’t going to die in the night. This was back before you could google that shit and name a panic attack for what it was. I didn’t know until I hit grad school and realized my massive coffees where followed by the crazies. I would drink a two liter of coke and then wonder why everything felt so bad. I still drink too much caffeine (if the correct amount for me is none). I’m slow to catch on that refined sugar does me no favors, either. How awesome would it have been to discover this when I hit puberty and the world was burning to begin with?

05) “Use your body.” Run. Jump. Play. Swim. I wish I had tried out for softball or soccer. That I hadn’t given up track in 12th grade because I had a boyfriend. What sense is that. I wish I had discovered yoga young. Or at least spent more time with my mom’s Jane Fonda workout tapes. Today, I have a small fracture in my right foot. And tennis elbow, when I don’t play tennis. And lumbago and sciatica, because I’m essentially an old woman. I’m wildly out of shape and overweight. It hurts to walk a mile. I'm convinced I'm going to die everything I have to climb a set of steps. I sit competitively.

And then, when I couldn’t take it anymore, I started to think: if it was 2038 and I could come back and tell my current self some things, would they be essentially different than what I wanted to tell my 13 year old self? Nothing’s changed. I am essentially the same person but caught, thankfully, I hope, in a time where I can still change. Top of that list? “Like what you like.” I loved writing in an online journal and I miss my Livejournal like crazy. Can’t go back but I suppose I can move forward. I can at least try.

Currently reading:
Zadie Smith’s Feel Free: Essays
Samantha Irby’s Meaty: Essays
Scott O’Dell’s Island of the Blue Dolphins

Currently listening:
Book tubers. (Reads and Daydreams, Lauren and the Books, All D Books. Actually, so many.)
Neko Case “Hell On”

Currently growing:
cucumbers, carrots, basil, parsley, cherry tomatoes, and lettuce

Currently watching:
The Crown.

Currently drinking:
mango lemonade