1) You can't answer the question: "Where are you from?"
2) You speak two (or more) languages but can't spell in any of them.
3) You flew before you could walk.
4) You have a passport, but no driver's license.
5) You run into someone you know at every airport
6) You have a time zone map next to your telephone.
7) Your life story uses the phrase "Then we went to..." five times (or six, or seven times...).
8) You speak with authority on the quality of airline travel.
9) National Geographic (OR THE TRAVEL CHANNEL) makes you homesick.
10) You read the international section before the comics.
11) You live at school, work in the tropics, and go home for vacation.
12) You sort your friends by continent.
13) Your second major is in a foreign language you already speak.
14) You realize it really is a small world, after all.
15) You feel that multiple passports would be appropriate.
16) You watch a movie set in a 'foreign country', and you know what the nationals are really saying into the camera.
17) You haggle with the checkout clerk for a lower price.
18) Your wardrobe can accommodate every season.
19) Your high school memories include those days that school was canceled due to tear gas, riots, demonstrations, or bomb threats.
20) You think VISA is a document stamped in your passport, and not a plastic card you carry in your wallet.
21) You automatically take off your shoes as soon as you get home.
22) Your dorm room/apartment/living room looks a little like a museum with all the "exotic" things you have around.
23) Half of your phone calls are unintelligible to those around you.
24) You know the geography of the rest of the world, but you don't know the geography of your own country.
25) You have best friends in 4 different continents.
26) You never really use a seatbelt
27) School trips meant going to a different country
28) You could walk into a bar and order a drink without being questioned
29) You often had food poisoning
30) You are a pro packer
31) Living out of a suitcase, you find, has it pros
32) You bump into your old teachers all the time
33) When you return to the States you are overwhelmed with the number of choices in a grocery store
34) You literally have real friends (not facebook, hi5, myspace friends) from different schools all over the world on your friends list
35) Everyone had a 'staff'; maid, house cleaner, driver and babysitter
36) You got excited when a relative sends a video tape of regular TV with commercials.. its in ENGLISH!
37) There was only one grocery store.. usually at the embassy that resembled the ones at home.
38) Once you get home you miss your adopted home and visa versa
39) You are never content in one place, be it city, state or country for long. You're a mover.
40) You never had a job until you reached college
41) Blackouts are quite common, yet after a while no one seemed to notice and sometimes you would find yourself doing homework to the light of your phone or flashlight
42) Class reunions.. are not at your old school.. not even close
43) Police, imported from a different country, guard your school...carrying machine guns
44) Your passport has more stamps than a post office
45) When you carry converters because you actually realize there are different types of outlets
46) When people give you funny looks because you are a gold or platinum elite member of your airlines
47) You don't think its strange that you haven't talked to your best friend in a while because you know you will always have a unique bond
48) You don't feel at home at home anymore
49) When a friend talks about their dreams of traveling across the world and you can give them all the best restaurants and places to visit.
50) You don't even bother to change your watch when traveling
51) When you have little or no contact with the locals but are best friends with people across the globe
52) When you speak many broken languages at once when you are drunk
53)You had to change your passport because it's full... not because it's expired... 54)Paying a cop is not considered a bribe
55)You've dated people from other countries
56)You start to keep your experiences overseas to yourself because people look at you as though you are spoiled for having the opportunity to indulge in a new culture.. sad
57)You are afraid to go back to visit your school because you know no one will be there that you used to know, they all moved
Monday, April 30, 2007
Thursday, April 26, 2007
27 going on 20
So today I went to a new hairdresser my friend Joan recommended.
I don't think I've laughed so hard EVER as I did when this woman was like "how is it that someone as young as you has gray hair?
I was like "how old do you think I am?"
"You can't be any older than 20!"
hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
So I tell her I am 4 months shy of 28 and she called me a liar. I showed her my driver's license and she said it was my fake ID.
In a way I loved how that made me feel. I love how it makes me feel to get ID'ed for cigarrettes, and I love how it makes me feel to have 20 year old guys hit on me. But I feel like I loose some of my credibility everytime someone thinks I am still going through puberty.
A lot of people pay tons of money so they can credibly lie about their age. I, on the other hand, just want to age and do so gracefully. Honestly. I don't die my hair despite the fact that I am quickly going gray. I barely wear makeup despite the fact that all those laughs I've had have left their mark so that I don't forget that I did laugh. And I try to act my age the best of my ability despite the fact that I am not your average 27 year old.
My mom says that when she was my age she had three kids and a divorce under her belt. She prays for the grand-children I would love to give her. But times have changed and here I am trying to selfishly survive, and I selfishly because even though having a child is so high up there on my list of priorities that it might as well be life, all the money I should be putting in my child's college fund, lately I find it's better spent on Furla wallets, Gucci sunglasses and weekend trips that will do nothing for me except make my already enlarged ass bigger.
I always thought that by 28 I would have it all figured out. I thought I'd have my own family and I would be living the happily ever after we are raised to believe actually exists. But I have nothing other than more work than necessary to show for my existence. I make family meals for friends, I knit for other people's babies and I coo strangers children...
All the while I pray that little Fiona will come...even if she is an accident...because that would be damn good motivation to trade Gucci sunglasses for those cute baby jumpers I often spend longer than necessary looking at when I go to Saks.
I don't think I've laughed so hard EVER as I did when this woman was like "how is it that someone as young as you has gray hair?
I was like "how old do you think I am?"
"You can't be any older than 20!"
hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
So I tell her I am 4 months shy of 28 and she called me a liar. I showed her my driver's license and she said it was my fake ID.
In a way I loved how that made me feel. I love how it makes me feel to get ID'ed for cigarrettes, and I love how it makes me feel to have 20 year old guys hit on me. But I feel like I loose some of my credibility everytime someone thinks I am still going through puberty.
A lot of people pay tons of money so they can credibly lie about their age. I, on the other hand, just want to age and do so gracefully. Honestly. I don't die my hair despite the fact that I am quickly going gray. I barely wear makeup despite the fact that all those laughs I've had have left their mark so that I don't forget that I did laugh. And I try to act my age the best of my ability despite the fact that I am not your average 27 year old.
My mom says that when she was my age she had three kids and a divorce under her belt. She prays for the grand-children I would love to give her. But times have changed and here I am trying to selfishly survive, and I selfishly because even though having a child is so high up there on my list of priorities that it might as well be life, all the money I should be putting in my child's college fund, lately I find it's better spent on Furla wallets, Gucci sunglasses and weekend trips that will do nothing for me except make my already enlarged ass bigger.
I always thought that by 28 I would have it all figured out. I thought I'd have my own family and I would be living the happily ever after we are raised to believe actually exists. But I have nothing other than more work than necessary to show for my existence. I make family meals for friends, I knit for other people's babies and I coo strangers children...
All the while I pray that little Fiona will come...even if she is an accident...because that would be damn good motivation to trade Gucci sunglasses for those cute baby jumpers I often spend longer than necessary looking at when I go to Saks.
Wednesday, April 25, 2007
I dance on speakers...
...because I am certain that I can outdance some of the sorry ass dancers they hire at some of the bars here.
I like to dance. Dancing is a non-aggressive way to take out all of your aggression. Do it long enough, and it may even make you loose weight!
I was talking to the principessa a few days ago about the days when we used to party all the time. Those glorious days when I could fit into her 00 pink knit bikini and we didn't look like baby pandas and baby cows. Oh those were the days! the days when we used to party all the time!
Apparently I am getting old.
Last weekend I went club hopping with my newest sidekicks and despite the fact that I tried really hard to get into it, it was hard. It was taking effort. Maybe it was because I wasn't drinking, or maybe it was because I wasn't feeling it. The fact of the matter is that it wasn't happening and I was pissed off at myself for that.
Lately I feel like I've been pissed off at myself a lot. And technically, I'm only pissed off at myself for that one thing; however, I feel like that one thing has taken over every aspect of my life. I'm trying to change. I think I've done an excellent job of straightening myself out; however, it doesn't feel like enough.
A good friend told me that sometimes you have let things go. To a point I believe that. The Principessa also told me that I have to walk away now that I have a reason to. But I ask myself, what if I don't want to? what if I am not ready? I try to even look in the opposite direction and I feel like a traitor.
So I dance. And even if I don't want to, I'll keep dancing until I forget that I loved A LOT and I lost BIG. I'll dance alone and hope that one day I'll forget...or better yet, I hope that he'll spot me dancing alone from across the room, that he'll forgive me and then will come dance with me.
I like to dance. Dancing is a non-aggressive way to take out all of your aggression. Do it long enough, and it may even make you loose weight!
I was talking to the principessa a few days ago about the days when we used to party all the time. Those glorious days when I could fit into her 00 pink knit bikini and we didn't look like baby pandas and baby cows. Oh those were the days! the days when we used to party all the time!
Apparently I am getting old.
Last weekend I went club hopping with my newest sidekicks and despite the fact that I tried really hard to get into it, it was hard. It was taking effort. Maybe it was because I wasn't drinking, or maybe it was because I wasn't feeling it. The fact of the matter is that it wasn't happening and I was pissed off at myself for that.
Lately I feel like I've been pissed off at myself a lot. And technically, I'm only pissed off at myself for that one thing; however, I feel like that one thing has taken over every aspect of my life. I'm trying to change. I think I've done an excellent job of straightening myself out; however, it doesn't feel like enough.
A good friend told me that sometimes you have let things go. To a point I believe that. The Principessa also told me that I have to walk away now that I have a reason to. But I ask myself, what if I don't want to? what if I am not ready? I try to even look in the opposite direction and I feel like a traitor.
So I dance. And even if I don't want to, I'll keep dancing until I forget that I loved A LOT and I lost BIG. I'll dance alone and hope that one day I'll forget...or better yet, I hope that he'll spot me dancing alone from across the room, that he'll forgive me and then will come dance with me.
Sunday, April 22, 2007
Tuesday, April 17, 2007
Yet another sad day for a family somewhere...
My friend Ellen went to Columbine High School.
Back when I was in college, while everyone else was celebrating 4:20 in a most corrupt fashion, she would spent the day all bent out of shape thinking about her friend who got shot by one of her classmates. It was a tragedy everyone knew had happened, but frankly it was a hard tragedy to relate because it is hard to imagine those things happening to people "like us".
...and yet, they do happen and then like now all we can really do is hope that things like that don't happen again ...
But they do continue to happen.
Thirty plus people died yesterday at Virginia Tech at the hands of what I can only qualify as a mad man.
I'm not one to follow the news unless there are some good news somewhere within them; however, I've been following this closely because in a university of 26,000 that really could have been any school at any time. And what's more, a handful of those deaths could have been prevented if someone had taken action either after the first shootings or before, when the shooter was writing those twisted plays that have become paramount in this investigation.
My stance on Freedom of Speech is that we should each be allowed to say what we want and that we should take the Don Imus' and Rosie O'Donnell's of the world with a grain of salt. But as a person who demands the right to feel safe at work/school/life environments, I EXPECT that when someone writes something that could be an obvious hint of a potential threat, that someone should do something. That's why we have counselors and the such!
Unfortunately, our society is not one that is very egalitarian and it is not one that shares values.
"rich kids," "debauchery" and "deceitful charlatans" are a part of our culture and we can choose to embrace them or not, but by no means should they have to worry about getting shot on their way to class for being the way they are!
My thoughts and prayers are with the friends and family of those who lost a loved one yesterday...a mere week before the Columbine shooting's anniversary. My thoughts and prayers are with the friends and family of anyone who has lost anyone and shouldn't have in these horrific incidents.
All I hope, and hope is a strong force, is that we will learn from these unfortunate mistakes and people will learn to take action when necessary and those who are disturbed will learn the value of human life. I can't imagine bringing a child into a world so unsafe. We lead wars abroad but we should worry about our own wars, the ones being waged by our kids in our own backyard.
Back when I was in college, while everyone else was celebrating 4:20 in a most corrupt fashion, she would spent the day all bent out of shape thinking about her friend who got shot by one of her classmates. It was a tragedy everyone knew had happened, but frankly it was a hard tragedy to relate because it is hard to imagine those things happening to people "like us".
...and yet, they do happen and then like now all we can really do is hope that things like that don't happen again ...
But they do continue to happen.
Thirty plus people died yesterday at Virginia Tech at the hands of what I can only qualify as a mad man.
I'm not one to follow the news unless there are some good news somewhere within them; however, I've been following this closely because in a university of 26,000 that really could have been any school at any time. And what's more, a handful of those deaths could have been prevented if someone had taken action either after the first shootings or before, when the shooter was writing those twisted plays that have become paramount in this investigation.
My stance on Freedom of Speech is that we should each be allowed to say what we want and that we should take the Don Imus' and Rosie O'Donnell's of the world with a grain of salt. But as a person who demands the right to feel safe at work/school/life environments, I EXPECT that when someone writes something that could be an obvious hint of a potential threat, that someone should do something. That's why we have counselors and the such!
Unfortunately, our society is not one that is very egalitarian and it is not one that shares values.
"rich kids," "debauchery" and "deceitful charlatans" are a part of our culture and we can choose to embrace them or not, but by no means should they have to worry about getting shot on their way to class for being the way they are!
My thoughts and prayers are with the friends and family of those who lost a loved one yesterday...a mere week before the Columbine shooting's anniversary. My thoughts and prayers are with the friends and family of anyone who has lost anyone and shouldn't have in these horrific incidents.
All I hope, and hope is a strong force, is that we will learn from these unfortunate mistakes and people will learn to take action when necessary and those who are disturbed will learn the value of human life. I can't imagine bringing a child into a world so unsafe. We lead wars abroad but we should worry about our own wars, the ones being waged by our kids in our own backyard.
Monday, April 16, 2007
on being the other woman...
I was not brought up to be "the other woman" so I am fairly sure that if m mother were so much as to read the title of this post she would have an aneurysm and die; however, it appears that I'm one to end up in such situations even if it is with the best of intentions (ie- entirely platonic).
My whole life I've known that I'm a boys girl, even despite my girlyness. I have a best friend who is a man, I've always had a "boyfriend", and I've always had boys who are friends. No drama. No stress. Just men in my life to keep me sane. To keep me from turning into one of those girls they hate and I hate and frankly everyone hates.
But I've recently noticed that even when you are trying to be good about things, someone will always turn you into the other woman. And I guess that to an extent I've allowed myself to be turned into such. Take my bestest (I know, not grammatically correct!) friend in the world for example. His girlfriend hated me so we had secret rondez vous. We would meet in the park on the way home or talk after she fell asleep.
One of my close friends here in Miami is married. She knows nothing about me, and yet I am a fairly constant number dialed out of his phone. No kissing, no sex, no nothing except good intentions and yet, I am just someone who REALLY exists (physically at least) when she is not around.
Then there is my buddy the neighbor. Oh this guy is great! Anyway, he has a live in girlfriend I've met once and like alright; however, as it worked out she is never around when we run into each other so we have a friendship outside of her. This weekend he asked me to join them at a party but I wondered if it wouldn't be too weird to show up and have a built in friendship with him and no way to explain it.
Sure, I'm an expert in discussing possible scenarios for meeting the significant others but nowhere near good at following through. I wish I could say "hey! I am friends with your man but I don't want him!" but frankly, what woman would believe that about someone like me?
I like being a girl-friend. Yet, as I get older I find this harder and harder to be. The boys have started to care, and it' not that they don't want me but they want to keep me as a secret. And even when they don't, it seems to hard to revert to a state of "joint friend". I'm the single girl. The one who lost most of her friends the minute she stepped out of a "we" situation.
I guess if I were some other girl, I wouldn't trust me. Not in my circumstances anyway...
My whole life I've known that I'm a boys girl, even despite my girlyness. I have a best friend who is a man, I've always had a "boyfriend", and I've always had boys who are friends. No drama. No stress. Just men in my life to keep me sane. To keep me from turning into one of those girls they hate and I hate and frankly everyone hates.
But I've recently noticed that even when you are trying to be good about things, someone will always turn you into the other woman. And I guess that to an extent I've allowed myself to be turned into such. Take my bestest (I know, not grammatically correct!) friend in the world for example. His girlfriend hated me so we had secret rondez vous. We would meet in the park on the way home or talk after she fell asleep.
One of my close friends here in Miami is married. She knows nothing about me, and yet I am a fairly constant number dialed out of his phone. No kissing, no sex, no nothing except good intentions and yet, I am just someone who REALLY exists (physically at least) when she is not around.
Then there is my buddy the neighbor. Oh this guy is great! Anyway, he has a live in girlfriend I've met once and like alright; however, as it worked out she is never around when we run into each other so we have a friendship outside of her. This weekend he asked me to join them at a party but I wondered if it wouldn't be too weird to show up and have a built in friendship with him and no way to explain it.
Sure, I'm an expert in discussing possible scenarios for meeting the significant others but nowhere near good at following through. I wish I could say "hey! I am friends with your man but I don't want him!" but frankly, what woman would believe that about someone like me?
I like being a girl-friend. Yet, as I get older I find this harder and harder to be. The boys have started to care, and it' not that they don't want me but they want to keep me as a secret. And even when they don't, it seems to hard to revert to a state of "joint friend". I'm the single girl. The one who lost most of her friends the minute she stepped out of a "we" situation.
I guess if I were some other girl, I wouldn't trust me. Not in my circumstances anyway...
Friday, April 13, 2007
Sharing is caring [?]
X person says:
thats none of my business...i don't know why you keep trying to bring me into this??...
Brown Eyed Girl says:
i'm sorry. i didn't realize you'd mind...and i just saw you online and thought i would ask.
X person says:
your business with HWMNBN are your business with HWMNBN...that's it...
...and these few lines got me to thinking...
I share a lot of myself with the world. I figured that knowing and trusting people (or in this case not knowing people at all) is enough to just go out there and expose myself completely. As a child, my mother said that I was "atrevida". A daring child who would one day grow up to be a daring adult.
In thinking about this assessment, I think that I was a daring child who grew up to be a vulnerable adult. Someone who knows what she wants and asks for it even if asking for it does more harm than good.
It just occurred to me today that maybe all this asking and sharing is what allows people to believe that I am their problem, someone who needs a hero, or someone who needs saving. I am not someone who needs anything other than a friendly face or maybe even a hug.
I think that effective now I am going to keep certain things private both in my blog and in my life. It seems unnecessary that I should bare my soul to the world just so that one day someone can say that I'm inviting them into my problems. Sure, I'll have my moments of joy.sadness.misery.excitement.introversion and I may somehow express them, but I don't want to share some things anymore.
For all it's worth, it doesn't even help.
thats none of my business...i don't know why you keep trying to bring me into this??...
Brown Eyed Girl says:
i'm sorry. i didn't realize you'd mind...and i just saw you online and thought i would ask.
X person says:
your business with HWMNBN are your business with HWMNBN...that's it...
...and these few lines got me to thinking...
I share a lot of myself with the world. I figured that knowing and trusting people (or in this case not knowing people at all) is enough to just go out there and expose myself completely. As a child, my mother said that I was "atrevida". A daring child who would one day grow up to be a daring adult.
In thinking about this assessment, I think that I was a daring child who grew up to be a vulnerable adult. Someone who knows what she wants and asks for it even if asking for it does more harm than good.
It just occurred to me today that maybe all this asking and sharing is what allows people to believe that I am their problem, someone who needs a hero, or someone who needs saving. I am not someone who needs anything other than a friendly face or maybe even a hug.
I think that effective now I am going to keep certain things private both in my blog and in my life. It seems unnecessary that I should bare my soul to the world just so that one day someone can say that I'm inviting them into my problems. Sure, I'll have my moments of joy.sadness.misery.excitement.introversion and I may somehow express them, but I don't want to share some things anymore.
For all it's worth, it doesn't even help.
Wednesday, April 11, 2007
To be better...
I HAVE SOCIAL DISEASE.
I HAVE TO GO OUT EVERY NIGHT.
IF I STAY HOME ONE NIGHT,
I START SPREADING RUMORS TO MY DOGS.
-Andy Warhol
Apparently people care that I haven't been writing these days.
I have actually been considering quitting the whole blogging thing and focusing on sharing less of myself and doing more things for myself. Taking care of business as one would say. But you know, it's kinda hard to quit when the experience is so cathartic. And to be quite frank, I need that sometimes.
Last week I went on a cruise (obviously not the one that sank). I spent seven glorious days exploring the ports of Cozumel, Grand Cayman, Montego Bay and Lavadee (for the fifth time). On the most part, it was good. But oh! the hangovers! Funny how when at sea drunkenness helps you preserve your balance and 15 drinks only feel like 3.
But I've since stopped that- the drinking that is.
I've been giving it a lot of thought and I've come to the conclusion that I need to control my drinking. Perhaps I don't drink so much that it should be considered a problem; however, in the past couple of weeks I've fucked up royally because I've been drunk.
I lost HWMNBN- this time for good because my judgement was impaired. And I could blame him for buying my drinks or for steering me in the wrong direction or for making me forget things that feel good to remember; but in the end, the one trying to keep up with him was me. The one who thought she was invincible was me. The one who believed she was right because "it felt right at the time" was me- even though I may have been dead wrong.
I worked so hard for something for so many years, and I lost it in 10 minutes.
Maybe I needed this to put an end to this whole ordeal. I just wish it hadn't ended as it did.
-------------
For those who care, I've now been alcohol free for 5 days.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
