Another week and apparently I get pensive late at night.

Another week of summer has passed me by. And I have a midterm in 9 days. A midterm in a class I started last Monday. Yeah, It seems very strange to me too but whatever. I won't have to study because duh! I just learned everything 10 days ago. Hell, I start studying for F/W term finals earlier than 10 days before the exam. I'm not worried.

I am, however, quite worried about my Humanities class. I have come to realise that I am not a Humanities student. I am an Anthropology student, a Cultural Anthropology Student to be exact. There is a difference. Humanities students are all about hidden meaning and implied messages and future impact. I ain't. I look at whats done and the social/cultural root behind a practice, custom, word usage, etc... OK, yeah I have to consider implied messages, screw future impact! I am trained to look at every culture as a non-static entity that it constant interacting and reacting therefore is impossible to predict. I like it like that. Sure it means every 10 years everything I learned it outdated or totally discredited but whatever!

I swear I have a meaning behind this little random moment of strangeness. I am taking a course on Terror (Actually the Horror Genre of literature and Film) and Terrorism (yes, Georgie's biggest enemy) and I am so freaking out of my league because I am so in to Anthropology that I can't think like anything but an anthropologist.

I had to read a book called a Very Short Introduction to Terrorism. It was actually a good book. Informative and unpretentious I thought I understood it well.

I did. If I were walking in to an Anthropology class. I was completely unprepared for taking that knowledge in to a Humanities class. I was thinking about causes relating to shared culture specific knowledge, and oppressive social laws and interfere with cultural believes and all that stuff that I have spent the last three years learning how to do. The prof wanted use to Map, Position and Relate concept without looking at the things I am used to looking at like home culture of the perpetrator but rather looking at the target. Yeah, that's a strange concept for me, and I don't fully know what it means and I don't know how to do it at a university level. I walked out of that class feeling rather stupid, confused and self-conscious about my abilities as a student.

I was longing for the simplicity of high school, which I completely took for granted while I was there. That of course lead to a whole new line of thought.Like how I graduated 4 years ago next month. It doesn't seem like its been that long. I almost feel like if I went to bed and slept really hard I could wake up and realize that the last 4 years haven't actually happened and they were actually a very vivid sometimes horrible dream. That's not to say I wish them away though. The bad things made who I am today just as much as the good things. Maybe the even more because the bad things make you think and reflect harder

No, too many good things have happened to want them gone.

I found academic passion and it shocked the hell out of me. I never once considered Anthropology as a major when I was in High School. Today, I couldn't imagine studying anything else because I love it so. I know I will keep learning about it long after I finish my degree.

I met one of my bestest friend (hi Laura!) in my first year Geography class. . She keeps me on my toes and stops me from being a total hermit crab.

I went to DisneyWorld with my other bestest friend, Krista. Yeah, pretty insignificant to most people, but it was an important trip for me. It was the last thing I needed to do before I could get over my childhood. Yes, I do mean get over it. I was not a happy child. No one took me, so I saved my money for a whole year, I got on a plane, stayed in a hotel by myself that first night, and I went to DisneyWorld. I saw mickey and donald and Ariel and I rode on its a small world and the mad tea party. I fulfilled that childhood dream and now I can lay it to rest. And Expedition Everest was the greatest ride ever.

I've made it more than half way through an honours degree. Yeah its taking me longer than I thought, but I' doing it. I'm proving to everyone who said I couldn't that I can, even it I am horribly lost in that one course. It's keeping my humble. Not that I think I need help wit that. My Research Methods course did that just fine.

I learned that it id possible to be away from home and not get homesick. That was during my second solo trip. I went to Maine. That was an important lesson for me. It started me on my wings in a way my first solo trip didn't. That first solo trip was one of the bad things that I wouldn't do over.

I learned not to be afraid of the Epi-pen. The Epi-pen is my friend and it means I don't have to fear the world so much.

There are some bad thing I wish didn't happen. I wish I had realized my beloved dog, Abel, was sick sooner than I did. Then I might still have him, or at least some of the guilt would go away.

I wish I told the guy who got away how much I liked him instead of letting my hurt get in the way.

I wish I hadn't stayed home to go to a movie with a friend that last weekend my mom went to see my Aunt a few months before she died.

I wish I hadn't lost the sterling silver faux Tiffany Bracelet I got for my 18th birthday that my sister spent her entire pay cheque on. That bracelet meant the world to me.

I wish I hadn't bought that black H&M dress that I never wore and hangs in my pseudo-closet three years later with the tags still on.

I hate regret....

She lives!

I have offically finished my third year of university. Three down, Two to go. I wrote my Anthropology of Tourism exam at 2:00 and now I have exactly 20 days kill before summer term starts. Correction, 20 days to find a job. Damnit, it ever ends! gah! For the first time since I was 17 I don't have a summer job lined up. It's kind freaking me out. I'm not going back to camp this summer and that has me bummed. Don't worry, I'll get over it. Camp stopped being fun last summer. I've outgrown it. That has me a little wigged too. I'm not sure if I'm ready to be a grown up yet. Ha! Like I have a choice.

Its more like I hate this current stage in my life. That really awkward spot when you're an adult but still in school and thus dependant on someone else. It's irritating and frustrating beyond belief. I just want it to be over now. I want to be a grown up or I want to be a kid again. No more of this in between bullshit and since going back isn't an option due to the lack of time machines that leaves me with moving forward. I know, I know, I'm going to look back in two years and realize how fast it went by but it seems so far away right now.

I'm actually excited about being a grown up. Starting a career (not just getting a job), moving out, paying bills, all that fun stuff. I've completely outgrown where I am now. I'm pretty sure I already said that but I just want to be sure you fully understand my irritation at the situation (I swear the rhyming was unintentional).

Anyway, Going now. Tomorrow err... later today, is celebration time with Laura. Blade of Glory then getting smashed... well pleasently buzzed since I can't afford smashed, at Outback.

23 years and 19 days

The end of the Fall/Winter term is fast approching at York University. The week after next and finals have already started for me. My first one was yesterday. I have two more next week, and another in April not to mention an assignment and a research project due on the 2nd. Yeah, I'm a busy girl. A very busy girl. I've become even more of a hermit because I don't have the time or energy to do anything other than read anf type. Even then I can only type education related things. Seriously. I've been staring at my computer screen for 10 minutes trying to pound out a decent blog entry.

I came up with two options. Unable to decide on which one I would focus on, I have decided to blend to completely unrealted topics in to one entry.

First topic. My Birthday was on Thrusday. I am 23. I don't feel 23. hell, I didn't even feel 22. I think I stopped aging about 7 months after my 20th birthday. At that point I was well in to my first year of university and had adapted well enough to survive and I stuck there. Worse, I have 2 more years a head of me. Anyway. I aged. I didn't really do anything to commerate that fact, but there it is. I am 23 years old. 23 is a scary number. 24 will be scarier. My mother was married by the time she was my age, married so long she was no longer eligable for the newlywed game. Hell! she was knocked up with me by her 23rd birthday! Not that I should be comparing myself to her cause that whole marriage thing didn't work too well for her now did it.

I kinda hate birthdays now. After 19 they aren't fun anymore. They become reminders of all the things you have yet to accomplish and how much time you've wasted. Or is that just me? I think I should just stop counting birthdays. Yeah, ill start marking my progress through life by...um.... Leap Years. There are fewer of them so I'll only have to have apanic attack every 4 years. So there. Thats my new plan.

Oh crap. There's one next year...... Oh well.

on to the second topic. Wanna know how long it takes to lsiten to 1500 songs on iTunes? 19 days. Yeah, it takes 19 days. I was scrolling through my iTunes library eariler this month and I noticed how many songs I had that I have never even listened to and I thought 'Hey, whats the bloody point?'. I always end up listening to the ones in playlists but I haven't bothered to makea new play list months. So I decided to listen to every one and delete the ones I didn't like and put the ones I did like in to play lists so I'll stop listening to the same 82 songs over and over. I figured it would take a week. After all I could skip all the Christmas songs, theres 92 right there I could skip. And the movie soundtracks could be skipped, there 116 gone. And the 82 I always listen to can so be skipped. That about 1500 songs out of 1716 (I can't be bothered to actually count). How bad could it be right? I mean I'm stuck to my computer these days anyway.

Yeah, playlists didn't get made (though a few were expanded) and I think I deleted maybe 20 songs. Most of those were duplicates.

But anyway, if you ever wanted to know how long it takes to get through that many songs, now you know. Nearly 3 weeks.

4.9 days my ass, iTune you liar!

grown ups.

My friend Vanessa is getting married. I'm happy for her! But it got me thinking, I am so not a grown up. And that also got me thinking, actually wigging but thinking was involved. Ness and I are the same age. Actually I'm 6 months older for for the sake of argument we are the same age. We started high school together. She was the person I got drunk with for the first time, and I was in her car the first time she went out without an adult in it. I was also with her the time we borrowed-without-permission her parents car and went to Buffalo to do some shopping. All very immature things to do. They were also quite fun.

And now she's getting married and thinking about stuff like weddings and down payments on houses.

I'm thinking about this research paper on Grey's Anatomy and where am I going to get a Luna Lovegood costume in my size for the Harry Potter Book 7 launch.

I am not a grown up. I feel like I should be since I'll be 23 next month. But I know I'm not one yet. I've been mulling over this whole grown up thing in the back recesses of my mind for a few hours (It was banished to the back because I was working on said research essay). Maybe I'll never been a grown up because my thoughts on what it means to be one keep changing. When I was like 12 I thought being a grown up instantly happened on your 18-th birthday. Boom, you wake up and everything is different. You start worrying about bills and retirement funds and you're instantly responsible for everything in your life. I also thought at age 12 that I would have finished school, got married right away and had kids by age 23. Pffffft. Not interested in that right now.

Later on as the 18 mark drew ever closer and I realised I'd still be in high school when I was 18 because I wanted to go to university now and that required OAC. so I revised the grown up idea and I thought that high school graduation was the magic moment of grown-up-ness. I'd put on my mortarboard and ugly polyester gown, pick up that piece of paper and and Boom! I'd be a grown up. Yeah that didn't happen either. I learned that I wasn't ready to be all independent yet. I still wanted my mommy to do my laundry and I sucked at remembering to pay bills on time if someone didn't remind me.

Then I took a year off, turned 20 ('Maybe when I turn 20. It's a big number. No longer a teenager' I thought. nope). Then I started University. At this point I knew that being a grown up was not in sight. As long as I was in university I wasn't going finish growing up. Its impossible to finish growing up when you're not really exposed to a world outside learning. I'm still here. Trucking away on my useless degree that I can't help up love and a new thought has popped in my head.

We never finish maturing. We get older, we experience new and different things and that means our knowledge of the world keeps growing and how we look at it keeps changing. Sure, that learning curve slows down but it never stops. So do we ever finish growing up? The idea of a grown up seems kind of silly now. I'm not ready to stop being a kid. I'm happy to be getting excited about book launches and spending more hours a week reading textbooks than I spend sleeping.