10 things I would say if I could meet high school Me

1. Kiss You Know Who. What are you so afraid of? It obvious that he likes you. Except he should have had the courage to do it too.
2. Don't stop dancing. You are really good at it and the day that you realize that, you'll want to go back to it and it will probably be too late at that point.
3. Just suck it up and wear contacts. Believe me, they are way better than glasses every day.
4. Don't date Nick Wagner. Don't ask questions. Just don't do it
5. When you say that you'll never miss high school friends... you really will. Keep in contact with them.
6. Don't rush into finding a major as soon as you get to college. Take your time. Trying to get ahead of the game will only set you way back.
7. Learn how to skateboard. It always looks so fun.
8. Take advantage of Cape Cod while you live there. You'll miss it every day once you leave.
9. When driving a boat, in addition to watching out for lobster traps, also look out for giant rocks. Actually, scratch that. Go ahead and experience that one. It will make for a good story later.
   
10. Continue to let your dad drag you to rock concerts of a bunch of old guys. You can use it as a flirting tool later. Example, "I've seen Eric Clapton in concert..."
    

I'm a war of head versus heart...

So I literally haven't blogged in almost 2 months but I found an amazing new Pandora station that got my brain flowing to a place it hasn't been in a while.

Why is it that when something big in your life happens, it makes you re-evaluate all the other aspects of your life. And we all know what part of my life needs constant re-evaluation... my love life.

I've just hit a wall where I have no idea what to do or how I truly feel. I can no longer tell if its affection or habit, a want or just a convenience. I want to find someone else to be sure, but unfortunately their is no one waiting, or at least that I know of. Part of me wishes he would just move on first to confirm that he was really over me. But the other part knows that very well may crush me. Part of me is loving the convenience and freedom of the single life, but part is me can feel lonely and misses having someone to share those little moments wish.

I am completely split in two and I have no idea what side to follow. I don't want to give up, but for all I know there may not even be anything there worth holding onto

"We are the champions"... or not, whatever

I consider myself a big Red Sox fan, and have strong sense of pride for any Boston/New England sports teams. I find it to be a privilege to have grown up in a state that had such a big sports influence and bring home championships left and right. I enjoy watching sports, but its also not something I'll do when I'm just sitting home alone. If I'm somewhere and "the game" is on or I'm hanging out with guy friends, watching sports does not bother me one bit, but when home alone, I will choose the Real Housewives of New York or any other girly reality show over a sports event any day.

Between the World Cup and the NBA finals my Facebook newsfeed has been flooded with posts about sports and to be honest, I've been completely disgusted. After the Celtics lost last night and I couldn't even go on Facebook. Yes, I was sad that they lost but I said to myself, "oh well, we'll get them next year" and moved on with my life. I guess not everyone else had the same reaction. Half of my newsfeed was friends from MA, complaining about the refs and saying it wasn't a fair game. The other half was bitter Orlando Magic fans that jumped on the Laker's bandwagon, just to cheer for anyone that would play the Celtics. And then today, my newsfeed has been completely flood with comments about the soccer games.

I've learned that sports can bring out the worst in people. The horrible and rude comments has almost gotten to the point that I'm disgusted. There is a difference in having pride for your team and taking it too far.

Life is short and stressful, and after recent events in my life, I've learned that somethings are just not worth getting stressed over. For me, a losing game or a bad ref call is not something worth getting my panties all up in a bunch about.

"Everytime I hear that song, I go back"

In Kenny Chesney's "I Go Back" there is a line that goes, "We all have a song that somehow stamped our lives. Takes us to another place in time." Going through my iPod today, I stumbled upon songs that I haven't listened to in months, maybe in years. Not only do songs stamp our lives, but I have connections between songs and people.

Poison Oak by Bright Eyes: I had a friend in high school named Paul. He was eccentric, outgoing, judged, yet loved by many. I can connect artists like Bright Eyes, Dashboard Confessional, Death Cab for Cutie, and Hellogoodbye to rides in my best friends white Jeep, with Sam and Paul, driving through the back roads of Cape Cod. As we all went to different colleges, we tended to grow apart from Paul. He joined the army and was killed in combat almost 2 years ago. Although I will never get to see him again, I can vividly picture our care free days whenever I hear these songs

Feels Like Home by Chantal Kreviazuk: A shy young girl, with a passion for dance beyond her years. I was paired to do a trio to this song with 2 older girls from my dance studio. We performed this dance at many competitions and shined each time. I had never been more in love with dance than the times I performed this on stage, and I can still feel my body mimic the steps when I hear this song.

Desperado by the Eagles-: My first love was in high school with a boy named Garrett. It was a relationship far too complicated for 17 year old kids, and the long distance between us became too much. He had a voice that made me melt and I used to make him sing to me over the phone when we couldn't be together. I know he did it half a dozen time but this is the only song that stands out in my mind.

I could fill a book with things like this if I went through my whole iPod. Whether its a word someone said while a song was in the background or that I can tell you exactly what episode of One Tree Hill that plays that song. Music has shaped my life in many different way, and this is an appreciation that I hope to someday pass along to my children

"I just haven't met you yet"

I just spent the weekend with one of my best friends and her boyfriend. I don't mind being the so-called "third wheel" but oh boy, did it remind me how single I am. It did spark a bunch of questions in my mind about where my future man might spring up from.

Will it be someone I've known for years and just has never sparked my flame until now?

Will it be someone I meet in a completely random place?

Will it be a friend of a friend?

And the itsy-est bity-est part of my mind wonders if its going to be that one that just can't seem to let go?

One of my biggest fears about falling in love in the future is not knowing whether it really is love, or its just the attention that I love. As much as I'm afraid of being alone, I'm starting to think that I'm almost equally afraid of falling in love again.

"I might have to wait, I'll never give up.
I guess it's half timing, and the other half's luck
Wherever you are, whenever its right
You'll come out of nowhere and into my life"
-Michael Buble

Part 2 of Major Life Changes

When my roommates or I have to vent or talk about life, or even just talk, we always sit on the kitchen counters. Dane Cook once stated that "something about the kitchen is medicinal" so maybe that's why we always end up there, but I had one of my biggest life epiphanies sitting on that counter. I realized that I never wanted to be a Speech Therapist. But now the issue was, what did I want to be.

Still sitting on the counter I made the probably not so politically correct comment of "I just want to work with little disabled kids all day." I realized I wanted to be a special needs teacher. Its something that I've been exposed to many different situations, but I was definitely out of practice with. I knew that with re-exposure, I would fall back into loving how I would shape and better both their and their parents' lives. I quickly jumped onto my computer to look up the information in the college course catalog, and introduced the idea to my parents that same night. Luckily, I have extremely supportive parents that knew how miserable I had been and backed my decision.

The next day, I went to an advisor in the education department and she helped me plan out the next 2 years of my life. YES, 2 more years of college. I was 6 months away from being done and I decided to tack on an extra year and half. I weighed the pros and cons and that time would be worth it. I'd be graduating with a major and a minor that would be extremely marketable in the field, and I have been told that I will be able to find a job whenever and wherever I want. And there is a very good possibility that those extra years in school will be almost or completely paid for by the University because it is a high need education field.

I pushed myself through the last few weeks of Communication Disorder classes, got mediocre grades, and I am now preparing myself for my first semester of education courses. I haven't been excited about school in 3 years and I can't wait to start my new classes.

Life this past year has been quite the rollercoaster, but I finally feel like I'm landing on flat ground. I knew I wasn't the happiest person, but you don't realize how unhappy you were, until you are truly happy again. I sorted out all of the things that were complicating life and can finally see a positive outlook on things to come.

So now that things are looking brighter, hopefully I can bring some new entertaining insights into this blog and ditch the life dampering ones for a while :)

Another Summer, Another Blog Post

Since its Summer again, and even though I'll be taking 4 classes, I should have more time to keep up with this again. My life has made some major turns in the past few months and the biggest one has been school.

When I went into college, i thought that I knew for sure that I wanted to be a kindergarten teacher. I had been a dance teacher for almost 6 years and being the oldest cousin on my mom's side of the family, I knew I had the natural talent and patience to work with children. After a semester of classes, I realized that the classes were so easy that I was bored and I also didn't want to spend 5 days a week with 25 five-year-olds because I had a fear that I wouldn't give my own children the attention they needed at home. So I started the search for a new major and career ideas.

I looked into every major in the catalog and couldn't decide what to do. My roommate at the time was a Communication Disorders major and I helped her study one night. I was intrigued by challenge of the school work. I thought it would be perfect for me. I could work with children, in a helping profession, and challenge myself through 2 more years of college and then 2 years of grad school.

By my Junior year of Com Dis, I was burnt out beyond belief. I had practically abandoned my sorority because I spent my days studying rather than socializing and I watched my relationship with Will go down the drain. I didn't give him the same attention I had given him before and he took a backseat to my school. I watched his heart break a little every time I forgot to kiss him hello because my nose was stuck in a book or my brain was distracted by upcoming tests. I busted my butt for C's when I'm used to getting straight A's. I would have given up but everyone assured me that I would get through it.

Senior year, Spring semester with only 6 courses away from graduating in December 2010, I seriously started to evaluate my future. I realized that all the hard work I did the past 4 years would be a waste because I didn't have the grades to get into grade school and the inability to get a job without a master's degree. Every other week I told my parents my plans for the future- whether it be letting my current job ship me off to whatever city they choose to go through intense retail manager training or attempting to apply for out of field grad programs in any state that would take me. None of these things I really wanted to do, but I'd settle on anything for some certainty in my future. I was/still am going through personal issues and I was looking for anything to tell me that the future was going to work out.

I've always been an overachiever and try my best at anything I do. I hate failing and I've always wanted to do something big with my life. The fact that I had no idea what I was going to do with the rest of my life made me feel like a failure. I knew I had to figure something out...

To Be Continued