day 7 : when I grow up...

I want to be a princess.  A real princess. With a tiara and ribbons and frills and beautiful dresses to wear everyday. With children and stand mixers and a kingdom of my very own: one that is modern with glass walls and state-of-the-art technology. Maybe something like this:

The Casa DeLeon in Paradise Island, New Providence/Nassau, Bahamas: one of the badass estates for sale on ArchitecturalDigest.com

Nice, right? Every few months, I get onto the Architectural Digest website and just drool at all the beautiful houses, like this one. Excuse me, did I say houses? I meant $*#@ing palaces. No man (or woman) should even be allowed to own residences like these. It's a waste of resources and an insult to philanthropy and world hunger.

But I want one. So bad.

At this stage in life when my peers are starting to move out of the idealist dreams of youth and into the concrete goals of adulthood, I find myself still fantasizing about an ambitiously fairytale life, surrounded by beauty and immersed in the simple joys of love and life.

It'd be nice to be accomplished - to live a fulfilling professional life where I thrive on learning and cultivate a spirit dedicated to service and, hey, maybe make some money along the way. But what I want - what I really, truly hope my life looks like in 10 years - is almost a nightmarish vision of domestic bliss.

I want children, and I want them relatively soon. Two, at least, before I'm 33. A girl and a boy. I want to be married, hitting my fifth anniversary. I want to live in a beautiful place. It doesn't even have to be an Architectural Digest palace...just somewhere beautiful. With a brand-new kitchen and wide, open spaces, and high ceilings.

The thing is I don't even know if it's possible. Going forward, the modern woman seems to be all about career and independence - about shoving domestic bliss up society's proverbial ass. Family can wait, and so can marriage for that matter. We're all living longer anyways, so what's the harm in putting off children and putting yourself on a pedestal for once? Be selfish, do something for yourself!

What I find interesting about this is that, were I to make the choice to move forward, as they say, and develop my professional career, I would receive all kinds of support. It would validate my parents' hard work, my expensive education, and the hours and hours of sleep I've lost as a slave to achievement. On the other hand, if I decided to drop everything and dedicate my life to family and home, I would've pretty much damned myself to disappointment and a lifetime of "Oh, you're a stay-at-home mom? How nice..."

I acknowledge that there are ways to make it work. That's the point of an entire blog. However, I also acknowledge the fact that it is a struggle that comes with (what seems to me like) more than its fair share of sacrifices. Having a child at any point in your medical career means inconveniencing others - finding people to cover for you. If you're missing work, someone has to take on your patients. If you're not at home, someone else is raising your child. These compromises are not worth the time saved by pursuing a career and building a family life at the same time. Inevitably, one side of your life will suffer, and to me, that seems like the ultimate sacrifice - not being able to do better than a half-assed job.

When I grow up, I want to raise my own kids because, in the end, my time with them is limited. I want it to happen soon because my father is getting old, and I want my children to be able to play with their grandpa. I realize if I don't walk the professional path now, I'll be walking it alone later, but there's always time for that, isn't there?

The funny thing about growing up: you spend your whole life thinking about it, but I imagine it's never what you expected when you get there.

day 6 : things I keep in my closet

The closet seems always to have been the proverbial cubby for embarrassing/potentially awkward things that are best kept to yourself. I imagine it's where boys keep their porn and ex-girlfriends' gifts - the same place one might roll up all the atrocious holiday sweaters and hope for a swarm of starving moths to nest upon them.

My closet, on the other hand, is always thrown open to the world. And so is my bedroom door, for that matter. At least when I'm conscious. Sleepytime is time for closed doors (because if a burglar were to come into my apartment at night and attempt to come into my bedroom, at least I'd hear my door open first! But that's virtually the only reason it stays closed). Perhaps this would suggest that I'm a very open person!

Anyways, the (very mundane) contents of my closet:

• lots of clothes
• Boyfriend's clothes
• laundry hamper (separated by whites, darks, and "colors" whatever that means)
• boxes with lamps I never use
• cheap black Room Essentials comforter (super scratchy, mostly polyester, would not recommend)
• cheap lime green Room Essentials sheets (also super scratchy, yuck)
• black body pillow I thought would be a good idea initially but turned out I just threw it on the floor =(
• Zoloft, Ducksquirrel, and Pikachu! They're just chillin'
• Luggage receptacle...container-things
• Under-bed storage (not under my bed, haha) full of shelving
• Box of electronics/wires
• Large plastic bins full of old textbooks and the remains of a failed attempt at a Sailor Mars costume
• sad neglected violin

That's pretty much everything. Nothing embarrassing to speak of. Except perhaps a pink nightie that looks a little awkward. That's ok.

It'd almost be nice if I did have something incredibly embarrassing or interesting in my closet. Maybe then I could actually write about it. Along the same lines, I have nothing under my bed either. Not even dust bunnies because - as it happens - I virtually took my bed apart and vacuumed underneath it today. That was pretty nasty. I mentioned the hair on hardwood floor thing before, right? Yeah.

I will say, though, whenever I notice my violin, I feel a little guilty. It used to be so well-loved, and now it's just sitting in my closet. I think I keep it there so that I can forget I have it, sometimes. I should get it out to play at some point...see if I can still hit a note. Or read music, for that matter.

Aside: once again, it is the night of Halloween, and this is my activity for the evening. I'm so cool.

day 5 : the short, the long, and the ugly

I feel like I could make a very crude penis joke here...but I'll leave it at that.

It is very late in the day right now - so late that it is actually tomorrow already. Kindof odd to think about since my periods of consciousness don't necessarily overlap with the periods of the day. Hence, I've been cheating a little in my 30-day challenge, posting after the day is technically over. I figure it's all right.

I had the most delicious red velvet cupcake today, from more cupcakes. My lovely roommate brought it home just for me, as they apparently decided to shower cupcakes on college students as some promotional shtick. At least that's what I imagine the goal to be for some food truck to schlep out to South Campus and hand out cupcakes in Chinese takeout boxes. They were cute! And super-delicious. Something about the icing...reminded me of the filling in lemon creme donuts. But with less preservative aftertaste.

This cupcake I consumed, of course, all by me onesy, shortly after having a discussion with my Peer Health Educator coordinator about diabetes. And my consumptive fear of it (less severe than my consumptive fear of public restrooms, but still pretty high on the list).

My grandmother has diabetes, and my experiences with carbohydrates suggest to me that I probably don't metabolize sugars as well as I should. The carb coma is a serious problem in my daily life, and I proactively limit my carbohydrate intake in the morning and afternoons when I need to sit in class, i.e. actually remain conscious, after a meal. It is truly unfortunate that I LOVE cinnamon rolls and red velvet cake and cream cheese frosting and all manner of sugary goods.

I know that type II diabetes is getting diagnosed earlier and earlier, i.e. in younger populations than ever before, so I wonder if other college students - people my age - otherwise healthy and mindful of exercise (OK, I guess that's not me...) have the same concerns I do. I imagine this is something I should think more in-depth about later, but for now, it is 2 in the morning, and I have little insight to offer.

P.S. I realize this is a...different way...to spend a Friday night. I would say, perhaps, very U of C. :)

day 4 : multiple-choice

Today, finally, I took the midterm I have been mentioning in my past few posts, and I have to say it wasn't as bad as I expected. It brought me back to the days of AP World/European/U.S. History, except that it was even easier. The thing that reminded me of the good ol' days of high school, though, was the format. Sixteen multiple-choice, two short-answer. Just like every high school class used to make 'em.

And like I said, these weren't even the really hard kind. They were the "Pick the statement that is TRUE" kind. This, of course, included the option "All of the above," but really, what else could you expect? There's always an all-of-the-above. Or a none-of-the-above, for that matter. Sometimes those can be even worse.

I've heard it said that multiple-choice isn't rigorous enough to test for breadth and depth of knowledge. I don't really have anything to say to that. It's probably true. I'm not doing the best of my critical thinking when all I have to do is circle A, B, C, D, or E.

But wouldn't it be nice if life were just filled with multiple-choice?

What, you say? Life is already multiple-choice? Not true, my friend! The defining feature of multiple-choice is that the choices are finite, and let me tell you, my choices in any aspect of life are never finite.

Think of the possibilities!

It takes me sometimes over 20 minutes to get dressed in the mornings. It's ridiculous. I stand at the door of my closet and run through outfits in my head. Even if I only had 10 different shirts and 10 different pants/skirts/what-have-you, I'd have 100 different possible outfits I could put on in a single day. And believe me, I have way more than 10 different tops and bottoms.

I live the sad life of the poor decision-maker. Not in that I make poor decisions, just that I take a long time to make them, regardless of their moral value. I would much rather let someone else decide things for me. In those not-uncommon moments where I tire of dressing myself on my own, I defer to the arbitrary but efficient decision-making power of my boyfriend:

"Red sweater or yellow?"

"Red."

"Skirt or jeans?"

"Skirt. No - jeans."

"This one? Or this one?"

"That one."

Really, he could care less about how it looks (and this I know to be true. He dresses himself in the same thing. Every day. He also wears sweaters under his zip-up hoodie); most times, he doesn't even bother to look. The nice thing is that I get handed a decision, and I cut my morning getting-dressed ritual down to five minutes or less.

Even more powerful than that, though: what if I could reduce my career options to a multiple-choice? It would be the end of so much educational and emotional strife! There are just so many choices - all I want is to presented a platter of four or five. If I could somehow take a test to determine what I would be best for me, I could skip all the time and effort wasted on "career exploration" and shadowing. It's all part of the process, I'm told, but damn what an inefficient process it is. Wouldn't it be great if someone could just tell you up front, "You would hate this job because of the long hours and low pay," or "You would love this job because it sucks up your life, which is great for you since you don't want anything but professional success." Wouldn't that be amazing.

This is poorly formulated, but really, I think all I'm trying to say is I want some simplicity. Some refreshing simplicity. None of this process of discovery that jerks you around as you try to find something that works for you. I'll have to re-write this post sometime. It is a sketchy blob of thought that hasn't yet matured into a coherent idea. For some other time, friends. I'm just trying to keep up with my challenge.

Boyfriend tells me these 30-day challenges breed bitterness and stifle inspiration and enthusiasm. I dunno. I'm liking it so far. =)

day 3 : pathological shopping

I confess. I have a problem.

I've seen that movie with Isla Fisher, Confessions of a Shopaholic, and I'm sad to say that I identify with her character, although I don't think my problem is as extreme as hers.

I've seen Chanel and Dior on the runway - I'm actually kindof a fan of Givenchy and Valentino, I think - but those kind of items are way way way out of my price range, and I wouldn't even dream of clicking past the online shopping cart to commit myself to credit suicide. Suffice to say, I've never gathered the courage to actually walk into a real live store to gawk at these things-I-want-but-cannot-have. I'm convinced my lack of purchasing power would emanate from my pores. And it wouldn't be the first time I'd gotten called out for being a plebe: once I strolled into a Saks Fifth Avenue with a Coach bag on my shoulder and, god bless his heart, a chicly dressed "sales associate" came out from behind his pretty glass counter to ask whether I was looking for a bathroom. Thanks, perfume sales guy.

Then again, it probably didn't help that I'd been otherwise dressed head-to-toe in Old Navy tank top, shorts, and rubber flip-flops. But still.

In fear of future such encounters, I've directed my energies into online shopping and clearance whoring. Old Navy, Gap, DSW, Victoria's Secret, New York & Company, and Express are all regular targets in my cyberquest for great deals. I'm one of those people who spends hours browsing, adding, and removing items from my virtual shopping cart, only to close out the window without purchasing anything. I'll even go so far as to enter my shipping information and redeem any coupons I might have before fleeing the site. And when I say I spend hours in this ultimately fruitless exercise, I mean hours every day.

It's phenomenally unproductive. Not to mention a huge waste of my time. Today, for example, I had a midterm to study for. It's happening in less than 12 hours. For a solid hour and a half, I clicked around the clearance section of Victoriassecret.com, trying to put together a cart full of merchandise that was just over $100 so I could get free shipping. Because, more than anything else in the world, I hate paying for shipping. Especially when it could be free. Luckily, I just happened to have a coupon code good for free shipping on orders over $100. Why? Because I decided I might as well have a VS Angel card for all those purchases I make at VS (their underwear, you must admit, is excellent). I think that puts my credit card count at just over a dozen.

Ridiculous? Probably. I don't even want to start on how many pairs of shoes I have.

day 2 : vacuum cleaners

It's midterms time at the U of C, and in spite of that, I found myself spending part of my lunchtime buzzing my faithful Dirt Devil around my bedroom and bathroom. I probably should've been studying, or working, or starting that biochem problem set that's due on Friday, but I felt an overwhelming need to remove offensive debris from my environment. We're known for quirkiness at this school, and while my clean fetish probably doesn't qualify quite as quirky, I think my love of vacuum cleaners could probably take me a long way. Yar, stranger. Vacuum cleaners.

If Dirt Devil were a god, I think I would worship him. Or her. There's something wonderfully familiar and comforting about the bright red plastic and high-pitched whine of a Dirt Devil that brings my back to the dust bunnies on the stairs of my childhood home. Before I foisted the chore off onto my little brother, I used to fret over the little fuzzies that got stuck in the corners. I hated that our stairs didn't sit on top of each other in 90˚ blocks; I'd have to run the vacuum over carpeted riser at an angle to make sure everything was dust-free, but I loved how pristine our white carpet would look afterwards. I could even feel the cleanliness under my bare feet.

Remember those UltraShark commercials on TV? I fell in love. The UltraShark was definitely at the top of my Christmas list that year. I was definitely superhappy when I got it. I definitely used it the next day.

When I got to college, a working vacuum was a luxury. First and second year, vacuums were a premium I had to go to the front desk to ask for, and even then, they weren't guaranteed to work. Usually one of the wheels was missing. At the end of the year, I had to prowl my thinly carpeted floor with masking tape to get rid of all the hair that had accumulated there. Gross and gross.

Life is better now that I have my own apartment. For one thing, I'm a proud owner of the Dirt Devil Versa - one of those lightweight convertible vacuums that's perfect for hardwood floors and hard-to-reach corners (don't I sound like an advertisement?), and I use it religiously. Is there really anything worse than gaggles of hair on a hardwood floor? I think not. Sometimes I think I must be going bald from the amount of hair I find on the floor. This, I'm sure, is not a unique experience.

Anyways. Back to work.

Aside: I used to worry that I had obsessive compulsive tendencies. After taking this quiz, I decided I had nothing to worry about. Take one question it asks:

Have you worried about acting on an unwanted and senseless urge or impulse, such as:

10. Physically harming a loved one, pushing a stranger in front of a bus, steering your car into oncoming traffic; inappropriate sexual contact; or poisoning dinner guests?

In fact, no...I have not.

the 30-day challenge

No, I'm not eating Special K for two meals a day for 30 days. That's ridiculous...although I can't say that I've never considered it. In any case, today is about the beginning - my beginning - of a 30-day blogging challenge. In spirit of the fact idea fact that it takes 30 days to form a habit, consider this a toast to habit-forming, writing practice, and the niceties of becoming an eloquent and - dare I say it? - entertaining writer. Because let's face it: who's going to read something that's not entertaining? Certainly not me.

It's been a while since I last made any sort of effort to write for an audience that didn't involve an instructor of some sort. My last blog post, as you might observe, happened over two years ago; I stopped writing in journals once my angsty teen hormones subsided; and the guilty/sad/embarrassing pleasure I used to indulge in writing fanfiction was swept under a rug as well.

I could have given reasons and excuses - traced my fall from grace from the moment that last blog post hit cyberspace - but I'm not sure I could really justify my departure from writing to myself. If anyone asked me (and no one has, but for the sake of argument and for the sake of pretending I have an audience), I'd tell them I actually was a good writer. With a point and a voice and an overwhelming respect for the beauty of words on a page. But that was the past. I was a good writer. But how about now?

"Good writing" is a term that in many ways makes me shudder. It brings me back to the days of Honors English in middle school - to the Shurley method, sentence jingles, and formulaic five-paragraph essays. (Aside: clearly this guy had more fun with Shurley English sentence jingles than I did.) As if there were an actual formula to writing well.

I admit, there is some merit to these methods in learning to write grammatically and correctly, but there is no real formula to teach something as complex as voice and word choice; I have doubts about the ability to teach fluency or organization either. Attempting to teach someone how to write is akin to attempting to teach someone how to think. Maybe I should qualify that: attempting to teach someone how to write well is like teaching someone to think well. What does that even mean?

Arguably, it is not keeping your paragraphs to a strict five sentences or more. It is not conforming your thoughts to an introduction, body, and conclusion or using transition words and sentences to coax your reader along the orderly thought-path you've paved for him in arguments and analysis. And maybe I'm not qualified to say, but good writing for me is voice and content alone. What are you trying to say? And how are you going to say it?

Which is all for me to say: I lost my voice. I'm struggling for content. Here's to me, trying to gather it all together again. And here's to you, Yifan, for doing it first.