top 30 things i've learned thus far...

my lovely, lovely roommate threw me a surprise birthday party this week, which is a whole other post unto it's own (i cannot even comprehend how much i'm loved. it threatens to overwhelm me every time i really look at it...).

but, my sweet and blunt friend jake asked "after 30 years, what do you have to say for yourself?" i didn't really know what to say and kinda floundered around until i found a kurt vonnegut quote that fit the occasion. but in reflecting on it that night, i thought it'd be good (for myself, if not for others) to write down what i've learned thus far.

here, in no particular order, are things i've discovered over 30 years on this little blue marble filled with wonderful and tragic things...

1. pancakes for dinner always make a day feel special, even if it's just a tuesday.


2. never listen to someone whose main argument boils down to "the human condition is sinful and you should always expect the worst." it's sometimes true but it's a bad operating system.


3. i'd rather cry too much than too little.


4. if you live through a hurricane, it's okay to hold a remembrance for your stuff. just remember the people, too.


5. there's nothing you can't live through, except death. that's not as uplifting as it sounds.


6. people will break your heart in new and different ways. that's not as sad as it sounds.


7. the palestinian people deserve to be free in their homeland. i won't apologize for believing that.


8. no matter how you prepare them, i probably am not going to eat beets.


9. we live in a racist, sexist, classist society. i want to keep learning how i contribute to those systems and what i can do to end it.


10. politicians are only very, very rarely agents of change. i was wrong about ralph nader, but still think i was right about dennis kucinich.


11. love is a many-splendoured thing, with lots of pokey bits.


12. things which will always make me happy: john steinbeck's "the moon is down", the movie "yellow submarine", american dream pizza, my family, radical Catholicism, community education, poetry slams.


13. things which will always make me angry: oppression in all shapes and forms, that one time i saw white supremacists up close and didn't do enough, rampant consumerism, people who steal from nonprofits, aggressive drivers, shopping at IKEA, violence, badly-cooked vegetarian food.


14. the answer to your prayers is generally you.


15. few things are funnier than Kermit the Frog's angry face. see here for example.


16. i will always, always, always let my children dress themselves.


17. i'm afraid of getting arrested but am less and less willing to let that stand in the way


18. my future husband will love the revolution, my dad's sense of justice, my sister's plays, my brothers' senses of humor, and my mac and cheese. the fact that such a person might not exist is only a small set-back.


19. i can't conceptualize of a day when i don't think about my momma.


20. intentional community makes more sense to me than the nuclear family. not necessarily for everyone, but certainly for me.


21. i believe in the Trinity as fact. i understand this makes me crazy to some.


22. i believe that a faith full of proscriptions, rigidity, and hate doesn't leave room for Christ.


23. roadtrips are almost totally defined by their soundtracks.


24. there is no food that isn't better with hot sauce. even cake.


25. sometimes my low self-esteem really hurts people, which makes me feel worse, but is the best indicator that that dysfunction needs to change. now.


26. i don't trust anyone who loved their high school years unconditionally or who got along with a stranger as their freshman roommate. that's just unnatural.


27. do not pick your own nicknames. and if you do, don't choose Raven. or Kit-Kat. just take me word on that one.


28. finger-painting is basically always awesome.


29. people live in poverty because of choices i make, and we make. not because they're lazy or drunk or stupid. and, even if they were, we'd still have an intense moral obligation to give back what's been taken from them, in a monetary and spiritual sense.


30. i might be doing okay with this one little life, but only because people better than myself are helping and loving me and have been for 30 years. thank you.

i guess that's what i know...