When I was younger, so much younger than today

Everybody talks about missing the early years.  About how they would do anything to be five again, carefree and simple without a hardship in the world.  Then they tell other people to treasure their youth while they can because before they know it, it’ll be gone.

While this is all true, I think sometimes we forget the frustrations we felt WHEN we were five.  Sure, we had less things to worry about.  Someone was probably waiting on us hand and foot.  But why don’t we love it when we are five?

Because my dear, it just wasn’t easy being a kid.

You’re vulnerable. You can’t do little things by yourself. You can’t even really talk to explain yourself.  Instead, you have to cry.  I remember wailing my head off every morning when my mom dropped me off at the day care because of insane insecurity issues.  If I lost sight of my parents at the supermarket for more then 5 minutes, my bottom lip would start quavering and I’d get a lump in my throat, scared that I’d get left at the supermarket alone for the rest of my life.

Exhibit A: Misunderstanding the good life

Birthday Blues

You poop your own birthday party because you can’t understand that turning a year older is a thing to celebrate. I’m not sure to this day why I was so miserable. See? I can’t even understand my young self.

Exhibit B: People misunderstanding you

Happiness...?

Now take a look at this picture. Cute right? Looks like I’m having a fun time? Wrong. First of all, I was too young to dress myself. Hence, the silly looking telephone pouchy overall set that I’m wearing.

Let’s examine this a little further…

Don't Start With Me

See that look? The bent arms, open palms? That’s the little 3 year old monster coming out saying,” Don’t. Mess.”

I told you not to start with me

Here it goes. There’s a little arm struggle and a clear and present frown here. Because when you’re 3, adults don’t understand that you don’t want to be held up and patted on the head  in every picture. You can stand up by yourself.

Oh No You Didn't

Oh boy.  Flailing arms and apparent grimace of face. But of course, when you’ve been asked once to do a task and refuse, you have to be asked again. I was stubborn as a rock. And obviously not in the mood for a photo op.

Exhibit C: Misunderstandings in general

Little kid shows and birthday parties with cake are always fun during childhood years. But sometimes we forget the things that may go awry in such occasions..

Friends, not Food / Photo courtesy of Shiyana G.

This is like a dream gone bad. How’d you like it if  your TV character hero came to your house and tried to eat you?  Just because you’re 3 doesn’t mean you’re automatic dog food.

But of course, I kid.(To a certain extent…pun not intended!) My childhood wasn’t all that bad. I appreciate being the age I am now, despite the rising responsibilities and increasing consequences. There are times however, when I wish I could still rock a sideways baseball cap and funky collar, feel cool and not get any flack about it from anyone.

Awesomeness

I just…felt like runnin’ !

The cross country runners at my school have a saying on their t-shirts that states “Running is a mental sport and we’re all INSANE.”

I can only concur with that statement.

I am by no means an exercising nut, and while I may appreciate a good exercise that gets you huffing and puffing, I find running to be the most mind-numbingly boring sport on Earth.  Sorry guys. During warm-up at volleyball practices, I used to bag on runners for participating in such a monotonous activity. Other athletes run to warm-up. You guys run to warm-up…and then run a whole lot more.

Recently though, I’ve been attempting to keep up a habit of running (and I emphasis the word attempting) to keep up, you know, a good regime, healthy lifestyle and all that jazz.  However, I have never experienced that physical epiphany runners talk about when the adrenaline kicks in and all you want to do is run your booty to the end of the world. And back.

Thus, my little loop around the neighborhood today was not exactly pleasant nor exciting.  So here’s my question: What exactly do runners THINK about on their six mile runs?

For awhile I let the sound of my feet hitting the pavement and the whooshing and roaring of the cars speeding by carry me across.  Then things started to hurt. So I did that little pep talk coaches give you when you’re running empty on fuel. “C’mon, PUSH! You can do it! You’re ALMOST there!”

That quickly failed.  So instead, I tried imagining diagrams of my fat molecules burning away and turning into muscle. And while I concentrated on the little biological structures spinning in my head, a Miley Cyrus song began playing in my head.

Yes, I know.  While huffing and puffing up a hill, all I could hear was Ms. Cyrus’s raspy voice singing “The Climb” to me all the way there.  I won’t judge you if you stopped reading here. But hey, it’s a good “inspirational” Disney song. Her? I dunno.

Finally, I imagined myself as scraggly bearded Forrest Gump running across the country with a dirty hat and a group of enlightened followers.

On the last stretch home, I spotted an extremely fit middle aged man with greying hairs running on the side of the road too. We looked at each other briefly before focusing on the route ahead. I thought about how pathetic it must have looked – me, a 17 year old at the cusp of youth! and energy!  panting and struggling behind a guy possibly 3 or 4 times my age.

So, I picked up my pace. Suddenly, I wanted to feel the burn in my legs, to feel as if I were exhausting every part of my body and FEEL the ache of my muscles working and… wait a second. I thought I hated running?

Maybe I am going a little crazy.

Writing to escape writing

You know something is up if I’d rather clean my bathroom than do something else.

Today, I decided I was going to do something productive. Get things checked off my list. Feel accomplished. So, I got a cup of water, turned on some Norah Jones tunes, sat down in front of my computer and gave myself a pep talk. “This is it Diana. You’re going to do it. You’re going to write your personal statement for college. Today. Now.”

But of course, I opted for a bathroom break. And found the sink speckled with toothpaste…the mirror not without water stains and the floor sprinkled with dust and hair. So I cleaned instead.

I’m not sure what it is about writing a personal statement that makes me so queasy. At first, I thought this part of the application process would go in my favor. So maybe I don’t have the grades of a valedictorian or I didn’t get a 2400 on my SAT. At least I have the mind and personality of an intelligent, curious and interesting student, right? … Right?

Basically, I resolved to myself that my personal statement needs to be pretty much the most awesome, witty and insightful thing I have ever written in my entire life. But, I can’t get over the idea of explaining who I am to someone on paper. I can’t advertise myself. I just am who I am. “What if they don’t think I’m funny? What if I’m not creative enough? What if I sound too much like an arrogant prick? What if they can’t take me seriously?”

Yuck. In my perfect world, college applications would be a breeze. My personal statement would take 10 minutes to complete, be visually pleasing and at the same time effectively show my various talents and “diverse” background.

College Essay of My Wildest Dreams

And now…I will start working on my real one. Hopefully.

To Bleed or Not To Bleed…

I may be a doctor’s daughter, but I still hate hospitals.

I don’t like the crinkly paper on exam beds, the fluorescent lighting, the smell of cotton balls and alcohol wipes…  In fact, walking through the sliding doors used to always my nervousness skyrocket through the roof. I would tap my foot through the cursory procedures knowing the dreaded vaccine waited for me at the end.

It drove me nuts when nurses tried to make small talk with me. “I’m going to get a needle stabbed in my behind today, how do you THINK I feel?”

But that fear has decreased over the years when I realized puncturing a needle into your skin doesn’t necessarily mean the world is going to end. I’m happy to say my blood drawing experience today was quick, easy and pretty painless.

My brother on the other hand, went home cranky with three cotton balls lodged in various places of his arm and an appointment to come back the next day.

This is a horrible picture, but I was trying to take it inconspicuously on my phone.

The lady took about fifteen minutes to find his vein and kept declaring in a Filipino accent “Oh-but-ah you are so tense!” “Your arm is-a so cold!” We watched her struggle for a couple minutes, with the vial drawing minimal amounts of blood.  Finally, another worker came over to try her hand at it. And she decided to draw blood from between the knuckles of his fingers. Who does that?

Nurse 2 tries her hand at it.

Amidst the needle jabbing and failed attempts, the nurse tries making small talk. She asked if we were married. I said we were siblings.
Awkward. See why I hate it when they do that?

Brother drives home angrily after getting poked around all morning.

No success happened, and my brother decided to give it a rest and return another time. He swore loudly about the needles all the way back to the parking lot while a little boy passing by stared wide-eyed and agape. I wondered if he was going in for a check up.

So I guess you could chalk it up to incompetent nurses or stubborn veins. I still don’t like hospitals.

Confirm or Deny?

There’s this issue that’s been brewing around in my head for awhile. For too long, it’s been unspoken about. For too long, no one’s really bothered to address the topic. Well, today I choose to speak up.

Facebook Stalking. I’m pretty sure you were thinking the same thing too.

Ladies and gents, in the 21st century stalking has become–yes–an accepted part of society. But I’m not talking about creepy men with long trench coats and sunglasses. Facebook Stalking can result in the following interaction:

“Her: Oh yeah, I had an awesome time at that resort on my vacation.

You: I know, I loved that floral dress you had on.

Her: How’d you know that?

You: Uhm….”

Let’s face it–we all do it to an extent. Newsfeeds practically bombard you with people’s business without request. And like I read in a magazine, Facebook stalking is more innocent–like calling your crush’s home phone and hanging up when someone picks up.

Here’s my list of the types of facebook stalkers*:

The Profile Instigator: The kind of people that do this want to get an idea of “who you are.” They read your religious and political views, interests and facebook groups. Passing personality judgments on said topics is completely normal.  ”Did you just list Hannah Montana as your favorite movie? Nevermind that you’re a great person, I’m unfriending you!”

The Wall Reader: This is for the little snoops. Normally, people click on a profile page, scroll down quickly over wall posts or leave a little link and go about their merry way. But you want to know if your friends are trash talking you on FB?   The “Wall-t0-Wall” option is open for use.  In a matter of seconds you can read back and forth responses written by your friends.   Creeped out? I am too.

Post messages on people's walls

The Photo Album Viewer:  This is pretty self-explanatory.  Either people just can’t get enough of your beautiful face, or they really want to find that picture of you passed out punch drunk on the floor in a sea of beer cans to get you kicked off the Associated Student Body. Tread carefully.

*Someone can be all three of this simultaneously,  of course.

Among the Facebook habits that bother me (friending the entire world is one of the them. If you are not Oprah, stop fooling us with your thousands of friends. No one is that popular) and quirks (i.e. Facebook Official “Relationships.”  Really?) one of the things I think you should absolutely not do is Facebook Chatting With Strangers.

No, no no.

I made the mistake of friending a guy who I thought I might have known because he had some mutual friends (but alas, assumption only makes a you-know-what out of you and me).  My morning was interrupted with the strange pop! of the FB chat notification, with a cheery “hello” and “how has your summer been?”

Number 1, you just made the person panic and go through every single person they’ve ever met to make sure they didn’t just forget who you were.

Number 2, while I think it says something about a person if they’re bored enough to strike up a FB chat with a complete stranger, that’s just weird.  If you want to warm up to someone, leave them a message, a wall post, a plant, ANYTHING but a Facebook chat.  That requires rapid fire interaction. An ongoing conversation. Wall posts you can reply back to give or take a couple days. A FB chat? No.  And if I can’t even see your face or shake your hand, I could be talking to a real creeper in a trenchcoat and dark sunglasses.

My “don’t” list actually only includes one for now, but it may pile on in the future. For now, Julian Smith expresses my thoughts about FB better than anyone else: