"everybody gets pinned with something, a reduction of them..."

Well tomorrow night will be the night to ring in the new year, the new decade. It will also be a time to say sayonara to the decade between me graduating high school and now. (whoa).

In my life and what I've gleaned from popular culture, the high school reunion (the 10 year mark) is the measuring stick. It's when you're supposed to be less fat, more successful, and better than anyone imagined, there by blowing them out of the water. For the past 7-8 years this hasn't been my real reality, especially since I've been able to maintain and rekindle the most amazing friendships from people in my grad class (and around it). I married someone who went to the same high school as me and my bestest friends went to high school with me. Those that matter/d have followed me to now so who cares what my "grad class" thinks? I'm happy to not want their validation or the validation of "rising above" high school and making my high schooler comrades wish they were nicer to me or revered me in a clique back then blah blah blah. So water under the bridge.

What's more interesting and present for me is that it's been 10 years since I've graduated high school, this year I will be 28! I'm so much the same and so much different, it's kind of fun to recall the transition and the adventures of the past 10 years. So many adventures that I feel like a different person completely. One thing that's different is that much of my life up to starting my MA//falling in love with stewart was that my life and my choices never felt like ME decisions or choices, they always seemed like I was either going with the flow or doing what I thought other people//"they" thought I should do. Whatever made me "click" in 2006 (the year I started my MA and fell in love with Stew) I owe my life to. I started to recognize what I wanted/desired/needed and how I could make those things happen.

The 101 in 1001 list was great in helping me orient myself around how to make positive change and accomplishment happen in my life and I've been sad to see it go over the past few months. Now it's like I have to be accountable to myself all over again. Eden said I should make a smaller list of goals and I bantered this around with myself, "will it ever be as good as 101 in 1001? will i be able to maintain it?" etc. But for some reason today I decided that with the coming of the new year I'd make a new list of goals for the next year (maybe it was the road sign that said, "have you made your new year's resolution yet? it was my LA story moment). I'll be putting them up on the left again and keeping track of them throughout the year and will hopefully blog about them in more detail and more often. So, without further ado, here is my small list:

1. reconstruct the bike in the garage. new paint, new breaks, panniers, new tires, lights, fixed gear, fenders, new handlebars.

2. figure out what i actually want to do with my life career-wise over the next decade (or shorter, whatevs): a) PhD, b) Teacher's Certificate so I can be a high school counsellor, c) find a long term permanent job that uses the skills I have now, or c) find a tattoo apprenticeship and be a tattoo artist

3. pay off the following debts: speeding ticket ($130), 4 credit cards ($4500), Line of Credit ($1530), and Outstanding Tuition ($1600).

Not that many but for me this is setting my sights high! I mean, pay off debt and decide what I want to do "with my life". I guess, because it's a little short that means that things are AWESOME in general. woop. (p.s. the link for the tutorial for the new year's garland above is here courtesy of the purl bee). xo