Today, I have officially shed the last vestige of being a student.
I closed my student credit card. So long, Citi!
I took out this credit card right before I started college because I thought that (a) I needed to build my own credit for the future, (b) it would probably be safer to use online than my actual debit card, and (c) I thought I could handle the responsibility.
This little credit card traveled with me throughout my college career, took me to Pittsburgh with my sorority sisters, and saved me over the summer when my Blackberry got fried. It bought a computer monitor, an iPod, and some boring things like groceries and gas.
However, at a 19.9999% interest rate - that's right, there are four (4) of the number nine after that decimal point - the groceries, iPod, and new phone quickly added up. And, after a while, I got crabby at the prospect of being almost 24 years old and having this student credit card with a regular interest rate higher than the default rate on my Old Navy card.
So, today, I decided that I was going to make the final payment and chop the sucker up. It wasn't going to go that easy, I found.
First, I logged on to Citi's website to pay the bill. To my surprise, there's this big, red, angry-looking alert telling me that a merchant where I had used my card had had their database broken into and that I couldn't make a payment online. So, after some swearing and slamming of the mouse on the desk, I called Citi's customer service line.
And I waited.
And waited.
And listened to bad elevator music while I waited some more.
Finally, after I spent a mere fifteen minutes on the phone making that final payment, telling them that I didn't need a new card or account number, and reassuring them that yes, I do actually want to cancel the card, I was out of a credit card and I wanted to hit my head against the wall.
I understand that they're in the business of basically selling a financial reputation through a piece of plastic with a magnetic strip, but if I tell you that I am cancelling your service because of a ridiculously high interest rate and no, I don't want a new and "better" card, then quit trying to sell me all of your high-end credit cards, identity theft protection programs, CD accounts, and whatever the computer is suggesting you sell me in order to keep my account open.
However, as I pulled out a pair of scissors and started to cut through the numbers on my first ever credit card, I felt some satisfaction. It was time to shed that last vestige of student financial management and move onto the adult world. That credit card taught me a lot, but it's time to move on to bigger things and lower interest rates.
Citi Financial, I bid you farewell.
-AA
Monday, January 10, 2011
Friday, December 31, 2010
Day 494 - Auld Lang Syne
Well, it was nice knowin' you, 2010.
Actually, this year has been a year of ups and downs. I've accomplished a lot. The last of three graduate school applications went out in the mail today, I faced the infamous GRE, and I got a promotion at Suite101. I wrote over 150 articles, didn't kill anyone at my Job from Hell, lost a little weight and saved absolutely no money, and to top it off, I stared down adulthood adversity and held my own.
All in all, I think I've done rather well.
As for 2011? I'm intrigued as to what it will bring. Graduate school? (Yes, please!) An end to the Job from Hell? Something big and shiny? Hopefully all of that and all of the love, happiness, laughs, and life lessons that 2010 has blessed us with.
Even though I'll be spending New Year's at home with my family and some of my dad's friends (my boyfriend's grandma is in the hospital, so we'll be celebrating his birthday, Christmas, our anniversary, and New Year's all at once sometime soon,) I'll be celebrating. After all, "for life is short but sweet for certain."
Cheers to 2010, and to having a new year filled with life, happiness, laughter and love.
-AA
Actually, this year has been a year of ups and downs. I've accomplished a lot. The last of three graduate school applications went out in the mail today, I faced the infamous GRE, and I got a promotion at Suite101. I wrote over 150 articles, didn't kill anyone at my Job from Hell, lost a little weight and saved absolutely no money, and to top it off, I stared down adulthood adversity and held my own.
All in all, I think I've done rather well.
As for 2011? I'm intrigued as to what it will bring. Graduate school? (Yes, please!) An end to the Job from Hell? Something big and shiny? Hopefully all of that and all of the love, happiness, laughs, and life lessons that 2010 has blessed us with.
Even though I'll be spending New Year's at home with my family and some of my dad's friends (my boyfriend's grandma is in the hospital, so we'll be celebrating his birthday, Christmas, our anniversary, and New Year's all at once sometime soon,) I'll be celebrating. After all, "for life is short but sweet for certain."
Cheers to 2010, and to having a new year filled with life, happiness, laughter and love.
-AA
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
Day 470 - Maybe It Wasn't So Bad?
I got my "certified" scores back from the GRE, and well, I'm two for three on meeting my target scores. Maybe I didn't do as badly as I thought I did?
I got a 5.5 out of 6 on the analytical writing section, which means I probably missed a comma somewhere in one of my essays and therefore didn't have "perfect grammar." But hey, at least I don't look like a total mental midget on paper!
Maybe I just overreacted after the test, which is a good possibility. I am one of the first to admit that I am an overachiever, I am a perfectionist (sort of,) and I always expect 100% out of myself - even if that means beating myself up mentally and physically in order to get what I want.
The one thing that stands out, however, is that I have lost all ability to take a standardized test. Granted, I didn't have that much of an ability in the first place. All throughout elementary school, middle school, and high school I would get high scores on those silly "proficency tests," but they were never in proportion to my actual grade point average. In fact, there was one year where I was getting a B+ in the most advanced math class for my grade and barely scored in the "proficient" range on the silly standardized test.
And yes, I did look that up. Thank you, Mom, for keeping all of this stuff nice and organized.
I guess I don't have much left to do for graduate school before the anxiety-ridden wait begins. I just have to come up with $50 for each application, $24 for transcripts, and a whole lot in postage and paper. If I think about it, graduate school is already starting to cost a lot of money - and I haven't even been accepted yet!
-AA
I got a 5.5 out of 6 on the analytical writing section, which means I probably missed a comma somewhere in one of my essays and therefore didn't have "perfect grammar." But hey, at least I don't look like a total mental midget on paper!
Maybe I just overreacted after the test, which is a good possibility. I am one of the first to admit that I am an overachiever, I am a perfectionist (sort of,) and I always expect 100% out of myself - even if that means beating myself up mentally and physically in order to get what I want.
The one thing that stands out, however, is that I have lost all ability to take a standardized test. Granted, I didn't have that much of an ability in the first place. All throughout elementary school, middle school, and high school I would get high scores on those silly "proficency tests," but they were never in proportion to my actual grade point average. In fact, there was one year where I was getting a B+ in the most advanced math class for my grade and barely scored in the "proficient" range on the silly standardized test.
And yes, I did look that up. Thank you, Mom, for keeping all of this stuff nice and organized.
I guess I don't have much left to do for graduate school before the anxiety-ridden wait begins. I just have to come up with $50 for each application, $24 for transcripts, and a whole lot in postage and paper. If I think about it, graduate school is already starting to cost a lot of money - and I haven't even been accepted yet!
-AA
Sunday, December 5, 2010
Day 468 - Excuse Me?
I had logged onto the Internet today and I found this article cued up in Yahoo!'s little news reel:
"Student's Loan Debt: $200,000"
Um, excuse me? Did I just read $200,000?
Yes, I did. The article follows Kelli Space, 23, who graduated from Northeastern University in 2009 with a shiny new BA in sociology and a monthly student loan obligation of $891 a month. Her monthly loan payments will nearly double next November, when her monthly payments are expected to increase to $1,600 a month.
At that point in the article, I wanted to pull Kelli out of my computer screen, smack her across the face, and tell her what it's like to have $1,026 in monthly student loan obligations right out of the gate. Yeah, Kelli Space who works one full time job and set up a donation website to help her pay back her loans, suck it up. You get a profile on Yahoo! Finance while I've taken a little over $4,300 out of my savings account in 2010 alone just to cover my student loan debts. Beat that, says my diminishing financial reserves. I work two full time jobs and still can barely pay my loan bills, let alone those credit card bills for things like gas to get to work that I've been paying with money out of my savings account. I've even taken to adding Google Adsense to "The Years Spent PC" to maybe earn a little extra cash.
Yet, there's a part of me that wants to empathize with Kelli and turn around and tell the people commenting on the article calling it "liberal bullshit" and telling people that "if you can't cover the cost of attendance with gift aid and federal loans, then you shouldn't be going to such an expensive school" just what is up. Let's review the situation I was in six years ago.
When I was a senior in high school, I applied to four schools, which shall remain anonymous. I was denied admission to school #1, which was a private out-of-state university that would have tacked on surcharges because I was an out-of-state student.
School #2, an arts school with a writing program, offered me a full ride package that included federal loans, but no need for private loans. The school was in a huge metropolitan area known for publishing houses, so I could have had it all right at my finger tips. However, I was forced to turn down said full ride because my dad was afraid I'd get mugged within the first 15 minutes of being on campus.
School #3 was a state school that fell under a tuition increase cap, meaning that it could only increase tuition at a maximum rate of 5% or so per academic year. Despite this school being the cheapest of them all, I was awarded $1500 in financial aid, no federal loans, and was told that I'd have to make up the rest of my $15,000 balance for my freshman year in private loans.
School #4 was a private liberal arts school that later became my alma mater, offering me what started out to be 50% of the cost of attendance in financial aid my freshman year, with that same amount being a little more than a third of the cost by my senior year.
See the problem here, folks?
Yes, students should exercise caution when borrowing money for school. For some, starting at a community college in a non-terminal associates program and then transferring to a four year college or university is a great option (until you get to the four year school and realize you need to retake classes.) For another bunch, simply earning a professional certificate or an associate's degree is enough to get them into their field.
However, I take issue with people who believe that those who are studying anything besides business, engineering, or "high profile" majors should not be in college. What about those who graduate with teaching degrees? Every culture needs teachers, and in ours you have to go to college and earn your license to be a teacher - it's a fact of life. What about our nurses (medicine is considered "high profile")? What about our radio jockeys, journalists, politicians, hospitality managers, interior decorators, and artists?
Hell, what about our writers? You can't turn around in this world without being influenced by a writer. Should all of us who have aspirations beyond six figures and fancy business cards be excluded from a college education because the humanities, the arts, the social sciences, and education don't necessarily pay as well as business degrees?
It all boils down to this. Unless you're shouldering a mountain of student loan debt, take a look around before telling us who should and should not attend college. What we need instead of segregating our society into the educationally-entitled and the educationally-unentitled based on our future plans is some reform. Cap tuition costs, provide more aid, cap the maximum interest rate on student loans, extend repayment terms, something.
Because as I'm contemplating temporarily changing my repayment plan on my federal loans, any ounce of reform is better than nothing at all.
-AA
"Student's Loan Debt: $200,000"
Um, excuse me? Did I just read $200,000?
Yes, I did. The article follows Kelli Space, 23, who graduated from Northeastern University in 2009 with a shiny new BA in sociology and a monthly student loan obligation of $891 a month. Her monthly loan payments will nearly double next November, when her monthly payments are expected to increase to $1,600 a month.
At that point in the article, I wanted to pull Kelli out of my computer screen, smack her across the face, and tell her what it's like to have $1,026 in monthly student loan obligations right out of the gate. Yeah, Kelli Space who works one full time job and set up a donation website to help her pay back her loans, suck it up. You get a profile on Yahoo! Finance while I've taken a little over $4,300 out of my savings account in 2010 alone just to cover my student loan debts. Beat that, says my diminishing financial reserves. I work two full time jobs and still can barely pay my loan bills, let alone those credit card bills for things like gas to get to work that I've been paying with money out of my savings account. I've even taken to adding Google Adsense to "The Years Spent PC" to maybe earn a little extra cash.
Yet, there's a part of me that wants to empathize with Kelli and turn around and tell the people commenting on the article calling it "liberal bullshit" and telling people that "if you can't cover the cost of attendance with gift aid and federal loans, then you shouldn't be going to such an expensive school" just what is up. Let's review the situation I was in six years ago.
When I was a senior in high school, I applied to four schools, which shall remain anonymous. I was denied admission to school #1, which was a private out-of-state university that would have tacked on surcharges because I was an out-of-state student.
School #2, an arts school with a writing program, offered me a full ride package that included federal loans, but no need for private loans. The school was in a huge metropolitan area known for publishing houses, so I could have had it all right at my finger tips. However, I was forced to turn down said full ride because my dad was afraid I'd get mugged within the first 15 minutes of being on campus.
School #3 was a state school that fell under a tuition increase cap, meaning that it could only increase tuition at a maximum rate of 5% or so per academic year. Despite this school being the cheapest of them all, I was awarded $1500 in financial aid, no federal loans, and was told that I'd have to make up the rest of my $15,000 balance for my freshman year in private loans.
School #4 was a private liberal arts school that later became my alma mater, offering me what started out to be 50% of the cost of attendance in financial aid my freshman year, with that same amount being a little more than a third of the cost by my senior year.
See the problem here, folks?
Yes, students should exercise caution when borrowing money for school. For some, starting at a community college in a non-terminal associates program and then transferring to a four year college or university is a great option (until you get to the four year school and realize you need to retake classes.) For another bunch, simply earning a professional certificate or an associate's degree is enough to get them into their field.
However, I take issue with people who believe that those who are studying anything besides business, engineering, or "high profile" majors should not be in college. What about those who graduate with teaching degrees? Every culture needs teachers, and in ours you have to go to college and earn your license to be a teacher - it's a fact of life. What about our nurses (medicine is considered "high profile")? What about our radio jockeys, journalists, politicians, hospitality managers, interior decorators, and artists?
Hell, what about our writers? You can't turn around in this world without being influenced by a writer. Should all of us who have aspirations beyond six figures and fancy business cards be excluded from a college education because the humanities, the arts, the social sciences, and education don't necessarily pay as well as business degrees?
It all boils down to this. Unless you're shouldering a mountain of student loan debt, take a look around before telling us who should and should not attend college. What we need instead of segregating our society into the educationally-entitled and the educationally-unentitled based on our future plans is some reform. Cap tuition costs, provide more aid, cap the maximum interest rate on student loans, extend repayment terms, something.
Because as I'm contemplating temporarily changing my repayment plan on my federal loans, any ounce of reform is better than nothing at all.
-AA
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
Day 463 - All Good Things Must Come to An End
Today is the last day of National Novel Writing Month. For me, it's the end of round two of the challenge to write 50,000 words in the thirty days of November.
Last year, I tore through the challenge like it was nothing. Granted, I had and still have a number of unfinished creative writing projects, and Suite101 was in the midst of a thirty articles in thirty days challenge that I was also taking part in. Including creative projects, work, and "The Years Spent PC," I had plenty of words to clear the 50K mark and print out my snazzy certificate, get my purple 2009 button for my National Novel Writing Month writer profile, and collect all of my goodies and bragging rights.
This year, my sorority little sister and I both decided to participate. After all, I had "won" last year with three days left in the month, so this year should be cake since I had already done the challenge once. Right?
Well, it's 6:50 P.M. EST, and I am exactly 8,000 words short of the golden 50K.
Yup, that's right, I don't think I'm going to slay this beast, folks.
I thought about ways I could win. I thought about going through my Twitter feed and copying all of my tweets for the month - after all, I had written every one of those words. I thought about all of the emails I had sent, the GRE essays I had written, and all of the extraneous words that I had penned throughout the past thirty days simply doing what I do every day. I even thought about calling off from the Job from Hell today to see if I could pull what was a total of 11,500 out of my butt before 11:59 tonight, but I realized that I would more than likely sleep in and lounge on the couch watching TLC all morning, eat lunch, and then find something else to occupy my time all afternoon until I realized the real reason I needed the day to myself.
Needless to say, I went to work today.
But then again, I've looked at everything I have done throughout the month and realized that, even though I won't get the cool little certificate to hang on my wall next to the one from last year, I have completed a challenge. I have written over 42,000 words (the word counter always adds words for some reason) on top of working 40 hours a week, studying for the biggest test of my life, and taking the GRE on top of it all. In addition, I've been writing for Suite101 and finishing up graduate school applications.
In my book, that's an accomplishment.
So, even though I won't be posting my little winner graphic on my blog this year and I won't have a certificate to hang up, I think that I have risen above quite a challenge during this round of National Novel Writing Month. Next year, though, all of those words had better watch out.
Even though I know I didn't reach the goal, here's to hoping that my little comes up with 16,000 words by midnight. If anyone can, she can.
-AA
Last year, I tore through the challenge like it was nothing. Granted, I had and still have a number of unfinished creative writing projects, and Suite101 was in the midst of a thirty articles in thirty days challenge that I was also taking part in. Including creative projects, work, and "The Years Spent PC," I had plenty of words to clear the 50K mark and print out my snazzy certificate, get my purple 2009 button for my National Novel Writing Month writer profile, and collect all of my goodies and bragging rights.
This year, my sorority little sister and I both decided to participate. After all, I had "won" last year with three days left in the month, so this year should be cake since I had already done the challenge once. Right?
Well, it's 6:50 P.M. EST, and I am exactly 8,000 words short of the golden 50K.
Yup, that's right, I don't think I'm going to slay this beast, folks.
I thought about ways I could win. I thought about going through my Twitter feed and copying all of my tweets for the month - after all, I had written every one of those words. I thought about all of the emails I had sent, the GRE essays I had written, and all of the extraneous words that I had penned throughout the past thirty days simply doing what I do every day. I even thought about calling off from the Job from Hell today to see if I could pull what was a total of 11,500 out of my butt before 11:59 tonight, but I realized that I would more than likely sleep in and lounge on the couch watching TLC all morning, eat lunch, and then find something else to occupy my time all afternoon until I realized the real reason I needed the day to myself.
Needless to say, I went to work today.
But then again, I've looked at everything I have done throughout the month and realized that, even though I won't get the cool little certificate to hang on my wall next to the one from last year, I have completed a challenge. I have written over 42,000 words (the word counter always adds words for some reason) on top of working 40 hours a week, studying for the biggest test of my life, and taking the GRE on top of it all. In addition, I've been writing for Suite101 and finishing up graduate school applications.
In my book, that's an accomplishment.
So, even though I won't be posting my little winner graphic on my blog this year and I won't have a certificate to hang up, I think that I have risen above quite a challenge during this round of National Novel Writing Month. Next year, though, all of those words had better watch out.
Even though I know I didn't reach the goal, here's to hoping that my little comes up with 16,000 words by midnight. If anyone can, she can.
-AA
Saturday, November 27, 2010
Day 460 - Gettin' A Little Crazy
I'm just going to preface this by saying that Black Friday is a tradition in my family. My mom, my sisters and I go out every year, do a little shopping in the early morning hours, eat lunch, and come home and crash.
But this year, my sister Erin and I did something completely silly, just for $hits and giggles.
Midnight Madness, anyone?
You see, the local outlet mall holds Midnight Madness every Thanksgiving / Black Friday, where all of the stores and the food court all open at midnight. They offer all kinds of deals and make a big fuss over it because everybody - well, until this year, except us - goes to the Aurora outlets for Midnight Madness. This year, since the economy has been bad and people around here don't have any money, stores were practically giving things away this year, with some stores opening at ten or eleven instead of waiting until the magic hour to unlock their doors.
So, out of curiosity, Erin and I went to Midnight Madness. However, we decided, or rather Erin decided and I agreed, that if we were going to do this, we were going to do it up right. We decided that we were going to be the first in line at the COACH outlet when they opened at eleven. Why? Because out of all of the stores in the three outlet sub-malls, COACH was by far our favorite and the store that everyone and their brother and sister were going to be waiting at.
We left our house at seven on Thursday evening. Yes, I said seven in the evening.
Erin and I got to the outlet mall around 7:30 and found a prime parking spot. In reality, any parking spot at the Farms sub-outlet is prime parking because, well, there aren't many parking spots to begin with. To our dismay, there were already about twenty people in line already! Did these people bring Thanksgiving dinner in a crock pot or did they just leave the dirty dishes on the table and run?
Disappointed, Erin and I got in line, pulled out our Blackberries, and prepared to stand in line for the next three and a half hours.
We weren't even sure if we were going to buy anything. Heck, we were both broke. But we had heard friends, coworkers, and sorority sisters go on about Midnight Madness for years, and if Erin and I spent summers of our tween years standing in line for hours in the blistering summer sun waiting to get the newest Beanie Babies on the day they were released, we could handle three and a half hours of standing under an awning and watching the ran pour down on the poor souls who didn't leave the house until after eight. Piece of cake!
Midnight Madness was fun, but it was more for our bonding time than to actually go shopping. We stood behind a pilgrim woman at COACH for three and a half hours, watched as an Asian international student tried to cut in line and then proceeded to pick a fight with the woman in line behind us, set foot in the Osh Kosh Bgosh store to say hi to a friend and then ran away, and laughed as Erin blindly jumped into a massive puddle as we were running through the rain back to my car at one in the morning. I wish I would have gotten a picture of the pilgrim woman, whose family traditionally dresses up as pilgrims and Native Americans for their Thanksgiving get together. She also said that she had gone to the movies in the outfit before arriving at the store. Strange!
After Erin and I drove around Ravenna looking for some place that was serving food (and couldn't find any, ) we got home around two. I started to panic because I couldn't find my cell phone, ransacked my car and found my phone under the passenger's seat, and went to bed. We were pooped.
Then we got up at six and went out shopping again. By the time lunch came around, I was so hungry and had such low blood sugar that I couldn't text anyone because my hands were shaking so bad. Hey, the last time I had eaten anything substantial was for Thanksgiving dinner!
All in all, I had fun. I didn't spend too much (thankfully, because another round of student loan payments are coming up) and I got to spend time with my family, which almost always makes me feel better.
-AA
But this year, my sister Erin and I did something completely silly, just for $hits and giggles.
Midnight Madness, anyone?
You see, the local outlet mall holds Midnight Madness every Thanksgiving / Black Friday, where all of the stores and the food court all open at midnight. They offer all kinds of deals and make a big fuss over it because everybody - well, until this year, except us - goes to the Aurora outlets for Midnight Madness. This year, since the economy has been bad and people around here don't have any money, stores were practically giving things away this year, with some stores opening at ten or eleven instead of waiting until the magic hour to unlock their doors.
So, out of curiosity, Erin and I went to Midnight Madness. However, we decided, or rather Erin decided and I agreed, that if we were going to do this, we were going to do it up right. We decided that we were going to be the first in line at the COACH outlet when they opened at eleven. Why? Because out of all of the stores in the three outlet sub-malls, COACH was by far our favorite and the store that everyone and their brother and sister were going to be waiting at.
We left our house at seven on Thursday evening. Yes, I said seven in the evening.
Erin and I got to the outlet mall around 7:30 and found a prime parking spot. In reality, any parking spot at the Farms sub-outlet is prime parking because, well, there aren't many parking spots to begin with. To our dismay, there were already about twenty people in line already! Did these people bring Thanksgiving dinner in a crock pot or did they just leave the dirty dishes on the table and run?
Disappointed, Erin and I got in line, pulled out our Blackberries, and prepared to stand in line for the next three and a half hours.
We weren't even sure if we were going to buy anything. Heck, we were both broke. But we had heard friends, coworkers, and sorority sisters go on about Midnight Madness for years, and if Erin and I spent summers of our tween years standing in line for hours in the blistering summer sun waiting to get the newest Beanie Babies on the day they were released, we could handle three and a half hours of standing under an awning and watching the ran pour down on the poor souls who didn't leave the house until after eight. Piece of cake!
Midnight Madness was fun, but it was more for our bonding time than to actually go shopping. We stood behind a pilgrim woman at COACH for three and a half hours, watched as an Asian international student tried to cut in line and then proceeded to pick a fight with the woman in line behind us, set foot in the Osh Kosh Bgosh store to say hi to a friend and then ran away, and laughed as Erin blindly jumped into a massive puddle as we were running through the rain back to my car at one in the morning. I wish I would have gotten a picture of the pilgrim woman, whose family traditionally dresses up as pilgrims and Native Americans for their Thanksgiving get together. She also said that she had gone to the movies in the outfit before arriving at the store. Strange!
After Erin and I drove around Ravenna looking for some place that was serving food (and couldn't find any, ) we got home around two. I started to panic because I couldn't find my cell phone, ransacked my car and found my phone under the passenger's seat, and went to bed. We were pooped.
Then we got up at six and went out shopping again. By the time lunch came around, I was so hungry and had such low blood sugar that I couldn't text anyone because my hands were shaking so bad. Hey, the last time I had eaten anything substantial was for Thanksgiving dinner!
All in all, I had fun. I didn't spend too much (thankfully, because another round of student loan payments are coming up) and I got to spend time with my family, which almost always makes me feel better.
-AA
Wednesday, November 24, 2010
Day 457 - Thanksgiving Eve
The pies are made, Theodore the Thanksgiving Turkey is thawing in the sink, and both of my sisters are starting Thanksgiving break today.
A lot of things have happened since last Thanksgiving. Heck, a lot of things have happened this year in general that I am thankful for. Some are little things, some are big things, but being thankful for a certain aspect of our lives doesn't mean that it has to be a certain size or shape or color or phase of matter. After all, most of the things I'm thankful for are things that aren't meant to be materialized, but it's important to remember that they are given life by the people, events, and lessons around me.
Life. I know, it may seem kind of silly to be thankful to be alive, but there have been a couple of times this year where being alive wasn't necessarily a given. Getting in a car accident was a big one, and every time I drive by that place I still hear everyone who told me that I honestly could have - and if I would have been going any faster probably would have - died that morning, I hold my breath.
It really hits home when I think about the brushes with death that have happened this month in the lives of my friends. One of my sorority sisters had an emergency liver transplant earlier this month, and thankfully she got the needed transplant (named Pedro) just in time as all of my sisters and I, regardless of where we were at the time, cried because we were so happy that everything came through.
Then, on Veterans Day, one of my classmates from college was killed in a car accident. He was 24, completely sober, and simply driving home from work when he went left of center and lost control of his car.
Without life, there would be no reason to be thankful for anything else because, well, it's not like I'd be able to be thankful for anything.
Family. No matter how much my dad annoys me with his attempts at trying to find me "real jobs," and no matter how much my sisters argue, and no matter how many times my mom forces me to be slightly more realistic, my family has been there with me through thick and thin. Without them, I'd probably be committed to a mental institution somewhere.
My family doesn't just include my biological family, though. Some of the most important people in my life, my sorority sisters and my closest friends, are included in my family. They may not be related by blood or by legal documents, but they are some of the most beautiful people I have ever been graced to know. They have become my shoulders to cry on, my cheerleaders, my reality checks when I'm thinking like a crazy, and a part of my family that I simply cannot put a price on.
All of the random material things. Even though stuff is stupid and most of my stuff is still in disarray from not cleaning my room since registering for the GRE, I can be thankful that I have warm clothes in the winter and breezy clothes in the summer, that I have a bed to sleep in at night, and shoes to wear on my feet. I have a car that's a little worse for wear (and possibly may need new brake pads) but it's better than nothing at all, and for that I am grateful.
Love. Love - the ultimate thing I am thankful for. I've done a lot of things that could push people away. I suck at answering or returning phone calls. I don't go out that much. I've spent too much time working my short life away and sometimes have neglected the people I love. Through all of my young stupidity, though, my family, friends, and boyfriend have stayed by my side and loved me all the way, even when I screw up and finally cry out that I need help.
It's love that makes me feel snuggly warm when I'm at home with my family. It's love that binds me to my friends and my sisters. It's love that still brings butterflys to my stomach when I even think of my boyfriend and it's the same love that makes me want to spend my life with him. Love may hurt, love may make me scream in frustration, but love ultimately is the reason as to why we're here, and for some, it's love that keeps us perfectly balanced in our current state. Even the Bible says, "Love goes on forever."
I have a lot to be thankful for this year. It may not seem like I've had it easy, and I know that I've had my rough spots, but I've learned a lot about myself this year and I've grown in ways that would not have been possible had I been forced to live paycheck to paycheck, had I hit a deer with my car, or had I been forced to reevaluate where I want to go in life.
So tomorrow, as I sit down with my family to chow down on Theodore the Thanksgiving Turkey, I know that I have been truly blessed this year. Hopefully, I'll continue to be blessed for many more years to come - and that is something to be thankful for.
-AA
A lot of things have happened since last Thanksgiving. Heck, a lot of things have happened this year in general that I am thankful for. Some are little things, some are big things, but being thankful for a certain aspect of our lives doesn't mean that it has to be a certain size or shape or color or phase of matter. After all, most of the things I'm thankful for are things that aren't meant to be materialized, but it's important to remember that they are given life by the people, events, and lessons around me.
Life. I know, it may seem kind of silly to be thankful to be alive, but there have been a couple of times this year where being alive wasn't necessarily a given. Getting in a car accident was a big one, and every time I drive by that place I still hear everyone who told me that I honestly could have - and if I would have been going any faster probably would have - died that morning, I hold my breath.
It really hits home when I think about the brushes with death that have happened this month in the lives of my friends. One of my sorority sisters had an emergency liver transplant earlier this month, and thankfully she got the needed transplant (named Pedro) just in time as all of my sisters and I, regardless of where we were at the time, cried because we were so happy that everything came through.
Then, on Veterans Day, one of my classmates from college was killed in a car accident. He was 24, completely sober, and simply driving home from work when he went left of center and lost control of his car.
Without life, there would be no reason to be thankful for anything else because, well, it's not like I'd be able to be thankful for anything.
Family. No matter how much my dad annoys me with his attempts at trying to find me "real jobs," and no matter how much my sisters argue, and no matter how many times my mom forces me to be slightly more realistic, my family has been there with me through thick and thin. Without them, I'd probably be committed to a mental institution somewhere.
My family doesn't just include my biological family, though. Some of the most important people in my life, my sorority sisters and my closest friends, are included in my family. They may not be related by blood or by legal documents, but they are some of the most beautiful people I have ever been graced to know. They have become my shoulders to cry on, my cheerleaders, my reality checks when I'm thinking like a crazy, and a part of my family that I simply cannot put a price on.
All of the random material things. Even though stuff is stupid and most of my stuff is still in disarray from not cleaning my room since registering for the GRE, I can be thankful that I have warm clothes in the winter and breezy clothes in the summer, that I have a bed to sleep in at night, and shoes to wear on my feet. I have a car that's a little worse for wear (and possibly may need new brake pads) but it's better than nothing at all, and for that I am grateful.
Love. Love - the ultimate thing I am thankful for. I've done a lot of things that could push people away. I suck at answering or returning phone calls. I don't go out that much. I've spent too much time working my short life away and sometimes have neglected the people I love. Through all of my young stupidity, though, my family, friends, and boyfriend have stayed by my side and loved me all the way, even when I screw up and finally cry out that I need help.
It's love that makes me feel snuggly warm when I'm at home with my family. It's love that binds me to my friends and my sisters. It's love that still brings butterflys to my stomach when I even think of my boyfriend and it's the same love that makes me want to spend my life with him. Love may hurt, love may make me scream in frustration, but love ultimately is the reason as to why we're here, and for some, it's love that keeps us perfectly balanced in our current state. Even the Bible says, "Love goes on forever."
I have a lot to be thankful for this year. It may not seem like I've had it easy, and I know that I've had my rough spots, but I've learned a lot about myself this year and I've grown in ways that would not have been possible had I been forced to live paycheck to paycheck, had I hit a deer with my car, or had I been forced to reevaluate where I want to go in life.
So tomorrow, as I sit down with my family to chow down on Theodore the Thanksgiving Turkey, I know that I have been truly blessed this year. Hopefully, I'll continue to be blessed for many more years to come - and that is something to be thankful for.
-AA
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