Taking a Step Back
I decided that I would take a step back and re-evalation my 23 years of life on this god-forsaken planet- just to make sure that I'm on the right path, to make sure I'm doing everything in my power to avoid the 1/4 life crisis. It's not just a myth, you know.
The first big decision I made (deciding to move in with my mother when I was 15), all by myself, was one that I regreted for a long time. But then I had another opportunity to un-regret that decision (I moved back with my father in Costa Rica). Little did I know that I was escaping the heat of hot desert, only to jump straight into the flames of hell. Yes it wasthat bad. I escaped a world which revolved around my bastard of a boyfriend, the guettos of Miami, girls with potty mouths, weekly police raids and descriminiation because I 'talked' like a 'white' girl (read: educated and a vocabulary that expanded far beyond using f*ck as a verb, adjective and adverb). I lost some of my innocence or naivety when I moved with my mother, by the way. And no, it's nothing to do with anything sexual. But little did I know I was entering a world, much, much worse. A world without friends and freedom, academic competition, promiscuity (of my classmates that is) and MAJOR depression because of those things.
Had I stayed in Miami, I'd have made my mother happy but would have slowly killed myself inside by staying with my long-term machista boyfriend who was slowly but surely making sure I was reduced to the size of a grease spot on the kitchen wall. Had I not chosen to go as far away as possible for college, my past might have followed me to Europe.
Had I not made the decision to leave Miami, moved to Costa Rica, only to move far, far away to Spain a year later, I wouldn't have met William B. Smith. In the blink of an eye my past was erased.
Re-evaluation and evaluation:
1. Lived, worked and studied in Spain for almost 3 years
2. Had the best couscous ever in a small village deep in Morocco (probably in Fez)
3. Purchased a $350 SLR camera and 'forgot' it on a bus to Valencia a few months later
4. Got stranded in Valencia because all trains and buses back to Sevilla were booked until the following day
5. Spent a month in Leuven, Belgium visiting a friend I hadn't seen since 4th grade.
6. Completely forgot how to speak the English language while sitting in a hotel room in Amsterdam. Enough said.
7. Wandered around the red-light district in Amsterdam at 3am looking for the 'bad guys' who sell treats to strangers, just to see if they existed.
8. I moved to Australia without giving it a second thought
9. I pretended to be Brazilian once, at a club, and people believed me.
10. I've been to a rave in a suburb of Madrid, that was built to resemble a castle but had a volley ball court outside....
If I would have decided that after graduating from Northeastern with a degree in Art, that I was just going to go out into the world and find a job, next year when I turn 25, I know for a fact that I'd all of a sudden myself lost and depressed in what they have coined to be the quarter life crisis. "What am I doing? Where is my life going?"
After evaluation my life and what I've done, I've come to a quick realization that I don't have TIME to have a quarter life crisis. My life is booked straight through 2008. I don't know exactly where I will be living until then or what I will be doing, but I do know that it will be some where remote where I can take bucket baths under the stars and eat millet cakes for lunch or somewhere deep in China where you have differnt slippers for entering each room of your house and it's forbidden to share fruit with others.
Did you know that in China you aren't supposed to share fruit with others because it's bad luck? Imagine!
The first big decision I made (deciding to move in with my mother when I was 15), all by myself, was one that I regreted for a long time. But then I had another opportunity to un-regret that decision (I moved back with my father in Costa Rica). Little did I know that I was escaping the heat of hot desert, only to jump straight into the flames of hell. Yes it wasthat bad. I escaped a world which revolved around my bastard of a boyfriend, the guettos of Miami, girls with potty mouths, weekly police raids and descriminiation because I 'talked' like a 'white' girl (read: educated and a vocabulary that expanded far beyond using f*ck as a verb, adjective and adverb). I lost some of my innocence or naivety when I moved with my mother, by the way. And no, it's nothing to do with anything sexual. But little did I know I was entering a world, much, much worse. A world without friends and freedom, academic competition, promiscuity (of my classmates that is) and MAJOR depression because of those things.
Had I stayed in Miami, I'd have made my mother happy but would have slowly killed myself inside by staying with my long-term machista boyfriend who was slowly but surely making sure I was reduced to the size of a grease spot on the kitchen wall. Had I not chosen to go as far away as possible for college, my past might have followed me to Europe.
Had I not made the decision to leave Miami, moved to Costa Rica, only to move far, far away to Spain a year later, I wouldn't have met William B. Smith. In the blink of an eye my past was erased.
Re-evaluation and evaluation:
1. Lived, worked and studied in Spain for almost 3 years
2. Had the best couscous ever in a small village deep in Morocco (probably in Fez)
3. Purchased a $350 SLR camera and 'forgot' it on a bus to Valencia a few months later
4. Got stranded in Valencia because all trains and buses back to Sevilla were booked until the following day
5. Spent a month in Leuven, Belgium visiting a friend I hadn't seen since 4th grade.
6. Completely forgot how to speak the English language while sitting in a hotel room in Amsterdam. Enough said.
7. Wandered around the red-light district in Amsterdam at 3am looking for the 'bad guys' who sell treats to strangers, just to see if they existed.
8. I moved to Australia without giving it a second thought
9. I pretended to be Brazilian once, at a club, and people believed me.
10. I've been to a rave in a suburb of Madrid, that was built to resemble a castle but had a volley ball court outside....
If I would have decided that after graduating from Northeastern with a degree in Art, that I was just going to go out into the world and find a job, next year when I turn 25, I know for a fact that I'd all of a sudden myself lost and depressed in what they have coined to be the quarter life crisis. "What am I doing? Where is my life going?"
After evaluation my life and what I've done, I've come to a quick realization that I don't have TIME to have a quarter life crisis. My life is booked straight through 2008. I don't know exactly where I will be living until then or what I will be doing, but I do know that it will be some where remote where I can take bucket baths under the stars and eat millet cakes for lunch or somewhere deep in China where you have differnt slippers for entering each room of your house and it's forbidden to share fruit with others.
Did you know that in China you aren't supposed to share fruit with others because it's bad luck? Imagine!
posted by Dirty Flamingo @ 3:56 pm
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