learning twenty-five

Failing, Learning, & Getting Stuck in Jacket-Coats at 25

Day 252: August 20

You failed.

You set out to learn something new each day of your twenty-fifth year, recording the details for the world to know (even though no one asked for this information), and you didn’t do it. Well, I should say, you didn’t record the details as you promised, it’s clear, even if only to you, that you’ve done the learning part.

But you failed to report it. To name it. To translate it into a takeable, buzzfeed-like list. And this bothers you. You think you can still do it. You think that this failure somehow matters to a larger audience. You’re thinking, yes, but…

Yes, but I can still piece it together.

Yes, but I can look at my instagram, my twitter, my facebook, and my email.

Yes, but I can get the details together. I can finish this project. I can catch up on over 200 days of living and learning and wrap it all up in the next 100.

Yes, but why?

Seriously, Dude. What’s your deal here? What is it you’re really learning from the day-to-day operations of your quiet, albeit lovely, life that the world needs to know?

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Sleep-Notes and Double Yolks

Day 36: January 16

You slept terribly last night, bad dreams, waking up every few hours, sheets in tangles. But, this is actually normal for you. So really, you slept normally last night.

And hey, dude, what’s the deal with your iPhone clutched in your hand? You always sleep like that?

Check it out. You wrote a sleep-note at 3am about a dream you had last night. Must have been something real important that you didn’t want to forget:

At the Barnes and Noble:

There was a public bathroom that, instead of an enclosed stall, contained just a toilet in an open glass room. Then entire store could see into it. There was a single sign posted with directions for properly using the bathroom that said, “PULL UP PANTS QUICKLY!” [so no one gets a good look at your naked parts]

Unfortunately, as is often the case for me, I struggled to get my jeans over my butt. I had to kind of wiggle myself into them. It was a slow process. When I turned around to find the non-existent sink, I saw a guy smirking at me through the glass. He was just standing there, watching me like a creep.

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Online Dating with Walking Pneumonia

Day 32: January 12

Get out of the house for church and brunch, because church always makes you feel better and brunch is delicious. Joke that you have walking pneumonia or something. Notice that people laugh uncomfortably and move their chairs a little further from you than normal.

Overhear a conversation you weren’t supposed to hear. That’s awkward. Remember how challenging life is when you can’t unhear things you’ve heard and you can’t unknow things you now know.

Venture to the coffee shop—by all means, keep spreading your germs—and order without thinking. Laugh when the waiter brings your food: Abita root beer and the only gumbo you’ll accept here. Comfort food. Good ole’ Louisiana comfort food.

Meet up with your trusty friend, because she knows you’re being irrational and she has some non-unknowable things happening in her life, too. Happy hour it up, and use that time to make big life decisions. Like online dating. Yeah. That’s good. Decide that you both need online dating profiles. Invite a trusty man-friend to help with this process, because you know, he’s guy and stuff. He’ll know what to say.

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Dreams Realized, Sorta

Day 28: January 8

Go back to work after a long, long break. It’s exhausting. You’re exhausted. But! check your email at exactly the right time and finally sign up for Baltimore Print Studio’s letter press workshop for February. Get excited. And then get in bed, because Dude, you are still sick.

Translation: Twenty-five is letter pressing. Beautiful, nerdy letter pressing.

____

Day 29: January 9

Take on a new responsibility at work: line up the graduates by shouting their name and telling them where to go. Realize, only as you begin shouting, that you are the worst at pronouncing strangers’ names. Try to compensate by saying, “He-blah-ble-blah over here! And I’m sorry. Really sorry. Don’t worry, I don’t call the names on stage. And congratulations!”

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Going Home: Better Late than Never

Day 19: December 30

Brace yourself. It’s another day with Delta.

But this time, you’re too forlorn to make detailed notes about the experience. Because vacation’s over. It’s time to get back to all those things you’re avoiding back in Baltimore. It’s time to go home. Back to real life.

But remember, that’s joyous! You like Baltimore. (Even if you’ve yet to convince your landlord the value of a dog.)

You drag your feet through the airport like a pouting child, willing your four-hour layover to move quickly. It declines.

In the meantime, you continue with the email and hard drive clean up you’ve been pursuing all week.

You come across a folder labeled “for the blog.” You remember this as the folder you’ve been putting stuff in for the blog. You open it and realize that you’ve been slacking. You haven’t posted any of this stuff. And really, it’s not so much “stuff” as it is “photos that made you laugh.”

Whelp, better late than never, right?

Photo of Baltimore Roads
This is how our lanes are repainted in Baltimore. I’m in the correct part of the “old lane” at a stop light. When I go, I have to jump over to those newly painted lines. Yeah, okay.
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Puppies are Productivity Killers

Day 12: December 23

Sleep in. You read that right. Wake up when your body is ready to wake up instead of only after hitting the snooze button on your obnoxious alarm seven times. (By the way, there are other sounds you could choose besides “hateful buzzer.”)

Grab a cup of comfort-coffee (the kind of you grew up on), and cuddle up with your computer, a sleepy puppy, and a days’ worth of work. Get up to refresh your coffee and come back to this:

Puppies are sneaky.
Puppies are sneaky.
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A Day with Delta: Nothing Fancy

Day 11: December 22, 2013

6am

Arrive at the airport with luggage that is already falling apart, and make a mental note to get new luggage. Also, note that you have plenty of time before your flight is set to board. (Good for you! You are learning how to properly travel—minus the luggage.)

Make your way to the self-check-in counter. Go for your credit card, the one you purchased this ticket with, and pause when you realize it isn’t there. Michelle. Come on. You’re about to board a plane for the longest vacation you’ve taken in two years, and you don’t have your favorite credit card (read: the one that works) on your person.

Stand there for ten, twenty, thirty seconds, internally freaking out, simultaneously trying to remember another method of checking in and the last place you used your credit card: shout your name and destination until they help you and plaza art yesterday…

Focus. One problem at a time. (This is a good strategy for you; use this more in the future).

Remember the technology machine you pay to carry around in your pocket. Remember email. Remember something called a confirmation number.

Ask about the boarding pass that didn’t print. Nod when the Delta Counter Lady says, oh they’ll give you one in Atlanta, even though you’ve flown enough to know this isn’t how it works.

Make it through security amid nervous first flyers and the Amish. Think about the Amish. You don’t know much about them. You should Google that. Them.

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Strangers, Pants, and Sober Texts

Day 1: December 12, 2013

Go to the gym, get a weird look from a stranger in the dressing room, and give her a weird look right back! Because, hey! She’s rude.

Get on the scale, confirm that Thanksgiving was full of bad choices, get off scale, look in the mirror.

Your pants are on backwards. Yes, now that you think about it, your pants do feel a bit uncomfortable this morning.

Translation: Twenty-five is learning to interpret the weird looks strangers are giving you. Don’t make a weird face out of spite; just say thank you and go fix your pants.

__________

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