25 in 25

Happy Birthday to Me!

Today I give to you 25 things I've learned in the last year in order of how I think of them.  This will, I hope, make you as wise as me someday:

1. Healthy food tastes better when you're 25 than it did when you're 20.  In fact, it tastes so much better that given the choice between ice cream and red peppers I will almost always choose peppers.

They always welcome me like this.  No joke!

2. Night is still infinitely preferable to morning, but there's a switch that goes off in your brain on your 25th birthday that suddenly makes 2:00 AM very very late.  Also, several years of a regular work schedule will make it impossible for you to sleep in past 8:00 AM, which, when you're still childless, is just unfair.

3. Sometimes you still don't feel like you could possibly be a responsible adult.  Like when you walk around your old college campus or when you go to IHOP in your bloomers after a show.

4. The stranger the food combination looks on the menu, the better it will probably taste.  (Pear and gorgonzola cheese on pork.  Trust me.)

5. That being 25 and single with (two) good jobs means that you have the incredible luxury and privilege of traveling wherever you want, including Disneyland.

6. Also, going to Disneyland is always fun, and no matter how old you are the Peter Pan ride will always make you want to cry a little and walking down Main Street will make you want to skip.

Still pretty sure my letter got lost in the mail.  That's alright.
I'm fine getting it late.  

7. Flying a kite is magical.

8. How important it is to shut down your email when you leave work.  People will understand if you don't answer until morning, and if they don't, they're probably going to be just as big of a jerk at 10:00 PM as they are at 8:30 AM.

9. That seeing a teenager succeed and say something awesome or do something kind or have ridiculous amounts of potential is incredibly rewarding.

10. Also - that I definitely picked the right career path.

11. That a part of me will probably always live in Neverland, Hogwarts, Narnia and Avonlea.  I'll never completely say goodbye to Sherwood or Camelot exactly.  Also I'm not going to try to.  I like my imagination, thank you very much.

12. That not all adults act like adults in the good way.  There are still plenty of oddly petty and grudge-holding people out there.  I don't want to be one of them.

13. That I have some serious work to do if I'm ever going to get to all the books I want to read and re-read before I die.  Also, that there better be books in heaven.  There is no end to the number of times I want to read Anne of Green Gables.  Or Little Women.  Or Sense and Sensibility.  Or. . .

14. There is almost nothing better in this world than hearing beautiful music played live.

15. That I have a pretty incredible set of parents and siblings and extended family.  For the most part, we all get along.  That's so, so rare.  And so lucky.

Alarm = little panda.  Me = big panda.

16. That your work environment can be a living hell with the wrong boss - and heaven if you have the right one.

17. That letting go is sometimes more important than holding on - especially when it comes to annoyance.

18.  That spending all morning devouring a good book is not wasted time, even if it means you're behind on a hundred other things.  You'll be happier doing the rest if you took the time to get away.

19. That my day is infinitely better when my bed is made and I feel pretty.  Taking the time I need to get ready in the morning is worth it, even on Saturday when no one really sees it.

20. That I will probably never be anywhere on time in the morning.  Mornings are the devil.

How I read books.  No joke.  More than one at once.

21. That taking yourself on a date somewhere you like is time and money well spent.  The company is infinitely better (and better looking) than the jerk who ignores you at the symphony or the boring one at the bookstore or the creepers.

22. That no one is immune of an identity crisis.  No one understands themselves as much as they pretend to, and generally you win out by giving people the benefit of the doubt.

23. That I can keep learning without the help of professors and assignments and classes, but it takes more discipline and it's important to surround myself with smart people who can help me talk through ideas.  I still can't learn as well as an island as I can with a group.

24. There is very little in this world that a fresh out of the oven chocolate chip cookie can't solve.  (Especially with the ratio of cookie to chip is in favor of cookie.)

Now I want one.

25. I am more capable, more smart, more kind, more gracious and more talented than I sometimes give myself credit for.  I can do hard things.  I can do more and be better.  I am not a failure.  I am flawed, but not wasted.  Weak, but not powerless.  I have the power to be better than I am, but what I am is still pretty good.