First, wow. I mean, I know I asked a fairly deep question but…wow, my bloggy friends. Wow.

Your responses…are enough to make MY brain do cartwheels.  They did, actually.  I literally said, “wow.”

I am a person who can be moved by music in a big way.  It’s like I morph out of my body and into the song and I don’t feel anything else except the beat, the bridge, the chorus, the highs and lows…I am the song.

And today, your comments were my song.

I realize some of you are new and haven’t seen the ups and downs and changes in me, in my writing and in my blog and its audience.  It was once much larger, much more…how shall we say…it graced the in-boxes and homepages and whatevers of many different peoples…(Yes, I said peoples.  On purpose).

Then it wasn’t.

And that’s how blogging goes.

I’ve accepted that.  I’m over it, actually.  Like me, don’t like me.  I’m still me.  So, yah.  Go put that in your pipe and smoke it.  Or something.  I don’t smoke so…no idea how that works, exactly.

And, truly, those of you who have been here from the beginning, in the infancy stages (kkktookmybabyaway, Shannon, franzi, to name a few) to those who’ve stayed through the first year…to my newer follwers (dare I call you that?) who have somehow stumbled upon my words…thank you.  For being here. 

Now, a treat!

I come from a weird background?  Weird to me, anyway.  Parents?  Divorced.  Siblings?  Yes.  Three.  One is 2.5 years younger, the next is 10 years younger and the last?  13.  Lots of stuff happened between my childhood years to right up to the point I met Time. And all of it happened really fast…too fast for me to process.  As an example: I tried out for 8th grade basketball.  Made the team. Went to summer camp. Improved. Tried out for 9th grade basketball in high school and made Varsity.  Started all 4 years.  Got into college. Played basketball there, too.  I walked in and was a starter. I broke lots of records. I received lots of accolades and newspaper articles and, and, and… I graduated college in 3 years with a BA and no plan…

And here we are. I’m processing…what? I have no idea how I got from where I was then to now.

I think this is most of an issue with myself.  Me.  Who I am at the core. I never really had a plan that got me to here.  And I’m sure no one really did have a plan to get them to the NOW,  but, if you knew me in the flesh, you’d know that I make lists for everything.  I plan out dinner before breakfast is over.  I need to know where I’m going and how I am to get there.  I want the goal out there somewhere, floating around, and then I want to make a plan to grab it.

I PLAN.

EVERYTHING.

I am rigid when plans don’t “work out” and I struggle changing mid-stream.  I mean, REALLY. STRUGGLE.  As in: (if) we were supposed to run one morning and don’t? MAJOR runners guilt that sits with me all day.  Or (if) we’re supposed to be going somewhere at a specified time and then….we don’t?  Or we’re late (and late to me is on time…)?

Hello, Meltdown Disaster.

I know, it really isn’t a big deal.  Or, it shouldn’t be.  And I’m trying to get there.  To the, “ah.  no biggie. Change of plans/pace/direction would be nice, anyway.”

(and just so you know, simply writing those words are painful)

So, IF I could do something again…I’d probably try to take a minute and actually think about what I wanted out of life.  Where I wanted to go/be/do/accomplish after school.  After basketball.

I never had that plan.  I never made one.  It’s almost dumb ass luck that I’m in the place I am today. 

I didn’t plan it this way.  I didn’t plan anything.  I was never that girl who was all, “I want to be married with 2.5 kids and live in the ‘burbs by the time I’m 27.”

(And IF that was my plan?  I’ve already failed.  Miserably. So, good thing for my planney parts that it wasn’t)

Now it’s like I’m trying to make up for that by making a plan?  But I’m struggling because *my* plan isn’t *mine* anymore.  It’s mine PLUS.  Plus Tim.  Plus responsibilities.  Plus the fur children. PLUS. PLUS PLUSPLUSPLUSPLUUUUUUSSSSSSS.

This is difficult for me because not only am I a planner, I am a selfish one at that.

Going along with that, I’m also trying, as in: making a conscious effort, not to be so selfish.  So self absorbed. So… ID  (As in: id, ego, super ego.  Way to go, Psych degree.  I knew you’d be useful…)

You know those people you see who are always smiley and nice and have lots of friends?  The one everyone wants to be friends with and always manages to find something nice to say about everyone?

Yah.  Not me.  Not…yet.

This is probably what I’d want to change if I was plopped down into obscurity (or Cassoday, Kansas.  Population? Less than the number of people residing in my neighborhood.  Also important to note: the Prairie Chicken Capital of the World.  Whatever that is.) and could be ANYONE.

I’d be that girl.  The smiley one with lots of compliments.

I have no idea why that is so desirable.  I mean, I’m not a MEAN person.  I’m just…I like things MY WAY more than I like anything YOUR WAY.  Even if YOUR WAY is better/smarter/more efficient/safer/not assbackwards.

I’m not sure how much of everything else – i.e. the “growing years” – that I’d want to be able to call mulligan.  Because, as most of you pointed out, calling mulligan is basically like a playing the lottery: Who the hell knows what you’ll get the next time, if you GET anything at all.  I think what I like about the idea is the knowledge (which I realize I wouldn’t have) and the control (which I also probably wouldn’t have).

Commenter Bert – whoever you are (Hi! Where’s Ernie?) - you said it best, I think.  It’s the future we should try to change.  Not the past.

I’m working on that.  I think.  At least, I’m working on trying to make a plan.  To make me into the ME I see on the inside.  Because the inside and the outside still aren’t quite all matchey like I’d prefer.

And I’m big on matchey.

One time, not very long ago, I realized Tim had been mismatching these two different pairs of tan work socks.  One pair had tiny brown specks and the other tiny brown flecks (Oh, there is so a difference to us matchey people.  The specks are rounder.  The flecks are like…tiny smears).  Anyway, I quickly fixed that mis-matchey faux pas and now?  Those two pairs of socks are all matchey, as they should be.

Your take away message from all this?

Order has been restored to the sock drawer.