time it was, oh what a time it was

I've been feeling pretty rebellious lately. I've been wanting to do things that I shouldn't do, and have been parading around my right to do them because I can.

Some examples:
-I can make people who don't know each other very well hang out with each other and like each other.

-I talk about my menstrual cycle, and whatever dudes, everyone who's not a guy's got one or will have one. I'm in Human Sexuality Class. It's a fact of life. A fact that creates life. Or doesn't.

-I stay up late. I do what I want!

-I stop making this list.... I diverge from the beaten path.

I just realize that as an adult, I have rights to my time, rights to what I want to do with it; I realize that I don't ever want to get stuck doing something I don't love in some place I don't love because of what's expected from me. I've watched enough people settle to know that I don't want to.

Things that make me feel good:
 -knowing things (probably number one most happy-making thing. i like feeling informed, i like having enough know-how to be able to interpret events, i like understanding people and things and making them surprised at my insight)

-making people mix CDs that they like (i waste about 30% of my time assembling music into an accessible arrangement or hearing things and finding out what they are when I'm in the mall, when I watch a commercial, if I hear it on NPR, etc)

-when i'm not sore, when the weather is nice, i like doing physical things-- walking up a lot of stairs, going for long walks, running to class, with iPod in ears

-giving people I like a hard time

-having people like Gina and Fangfei who always support me

-my band whose genre I will never be able to really explain

-wasting time psychoanalyzing people

-reading other people's blogs; we're all little authors of our own prose

-watching CNN, they're like one of the only things I trust for news/ also, watching Christiane Amanpour podcasts on the treadmill, listening to This American Life at work (an idea I totally ripped from Becca who is an expert on the Teapot Dome Scandal)

-catching up on reading-- a load off and in my mind at the same time

-feeling beautiful in my own skin

-banter, talking to my friends, making friends, talking to Suvai, Crystal, Becca-- people who I've realized will always like me no matter how long it's been since we've talked last

-singing songs that I like to sing, reveling in how awesome a song is, dancing with myself in the car

-when I'm alone at home and get to jam with myself on the piano and not be shy about it at all because no one will listen/judge

-editing articles at SSFP; I get so much smarter from reading people's articles, and I get to hang out with some really intelligent, really funny kids

-making phytagel at the Gilroy Lab (it's actually a very calming task for some reason) and pouring plates

-Ugly Betty-- for some reason, I just always identify with what's going on. Being true to yourself? Pursuing your passion? Not giving it up for anything? Caring about your family? These are all values that I can subscribe to-- a formula that will never get old. This show just does a really good job of keeping a sense of humor, keeping a sense of reality, making people beautiful but flawed, ugly but incredibly attractive-- in short, displaying the contradictions inherent in people.

-watching Greek with Jason

-stretching out in a warm bed.

-watching TV with my parents who are somehow becoming more like me as I become more like them, having a dad who will always remind me of where I came from, who I used to be, and what's good about me,  and a mother who always makes sure that I've eaten, that I'm warm, and is really non-judgmental about my life choices