I discuss my former self

It’s really weird to me how college shapes and changes you. For instance, when I came to college I was a pleasant teenager who rarely cursed, never broke the rules, and generally refused to find fault in anyone. Now I’m a somewhat crude adult who enjoys cursing to show any emotion and bending rules like it’s my job. My waist has expanded along with my movie knowledge - so basically at an alarming rate – and I have discovered I actually enjoy hamburgers immensely (before this year, I would never eat them unless it’s what my mom put before me at the dinner table). I now have no qualms with releasing my bowels in a public restroom (or talking about it, as you can see) and I learned how to burp earlier this year. I often wonder if the old me would be friends with the new me; I think it would be a beautiful friendship. We still have some similarities – the ability to squander away hours upon hours of precious time, the lack of desire to actually put forth an effort into anything, the capacity to talk for an extended amount of time without running out of lame stories and silly ideas… All the things that I sort of wished to change back then, and which I have learned to accept now. The old me would like the sense of confidence the new me has; she’d probably do a mental eye roll at my tendency towards sweats over cute tops or skirts, but inside be a bit jealous. She’d definitely wonder how she became me…

I never planned to be so unashamed of my life or thoughts. I always wanted to achieve a bold sense of self, but not with this self – the one who inwardly, sometimes outwardly, laughs at other’s stupid choices or similar misfortunes. I wanted it to be with a self who was sure of her intelligence, was sure where life was taking her, and was going somewhere such as the top – quickly. So now it’s somewhat weird to look back with sweet disappointment on how much I fell short of my dreams from senior year of high school, and then to laugh at those dreams for their sheer unfeasibility. It’s as if my high school self thought that college would make me a completely different person. I have never been, and never will be, a morning person. Sorry old self, you knew deep down that you would never in your life succeed at waking up at 6AM every morning to run a mile or two. Really, you should know that you’ll most likely never run a mile, and definitely not two. You should have known that you weren’t going to start working on papers as soon as they were assigned. Procrastinators rarely ever change. You weren’t suddenly going to start writing for the school paper just because you were a Journalism major, and you definitely weren’t going to become the editor of Marie Claire in the next couple of years.

Which brings me to my next difference – I came in as a Journalism major, with a minor (and great love for) German. Now I’m an Accounting major who is still getting her minor in German, but wants to cry nearly every night as she sits over the homework for those ridiculous classes (Thank God I’m almost done with that). I’ve discovered that I love Accounting and all of its boring facets. My only major apprehension with the entire situation is that every accountant I’ve ever met has been completely boring in their appearance and actions. They’ve all been perfectly nice people, but I think sitting and counting funds all day has really sucked the life out of them. I really don’t want to be dull when I get older. I want to be exciting and fun. Of course, what adult can be exciting and fun to a teenager or young adult? If they’re fun, a little piece of you wonders about their maturity level and why they never grew up. I want to grow up at some point… but not for at least the next 10 years.

Funny story – I started out to discuss my new-found love for all things baking. Obviously that didn’t happen, and I’m running out of time. How bothersome. There’s one thing that has yet to change – my inability to focus on anything. My papers/essays generally generate comments to the tune of “lacks focus,” “horrible transitions. I don’t see how you got from one idea to the next,” or my personal favorite, “displays complex thought!” That last one always makes me giggle because if they could hear the constant white noise going on in my brain, they’d understand that I merely tuned in to a couple of those brain waves for short amounts of time and wrote down what was on my mind. Yes, comparing the evolution of communism to the process of baking a cake was extremely intriguing and thoughtful, but I should probably let you know that I was thinking about communism because your prompt told me to write about it, and cake was on my mind because my birthday was coming up and I was trying to decide what flavor I wanted. I guess it worked out in the end though, so no complaints.

And with that one last trip off of the supposed path of this blog entry, I’m going to go ahead and end it. I shall write about cooking another day. Maybe I’ll combine it with my newly revived love of homemade smoothies to make it longer, and possibly less boring.