So, around this time of year, I usually post something in order to lighten my birthday mood. Historically, I have had my ups and downs with the entire idea of getting older, but this year I decided to focus on something a little different than my youth slipping away. This year, I decided to try a little introspection (which isn’t entirely out-of-character for me!). I turned 26-years-old (yikes!) recently, which I guess means that I have lived 26 years so far, and I just took a few minutes to think about all of the life I’ve experienced in that amount of time... just for some perspective... and here’s what I came up with... not everything is a happy thing, but it’s all contributed to me becoming the 26-year-old I am today.

In my first 26 years, I have...

...met and talked with (all at the time current) a Detroit Mayor and 2 Mayors of Toyota City, Japan...
...been to a Star Trek Convention...
...suffered from Scarlet Fever...
...grew 2 extra teeth (an extra baby and an extra adult incisor!)...
...got a foul ball at a Detroit Tigers' game...
...had a large display, including merchandise and mannequins, at a department store fall on me...
...made a group of close friends that have been in my life for 12 years and counting...
...been bitten by a dog (a Golden Retriever, man’s best friend!)...

...lost my father after his long fight with cancer...
...had 7 teeth pulled, including 4 "permanent" molars (but I still have all of my wisdom teeth!)...
...had a "fever" hallucination...
...been rear-ended by a bus (in driver’s ed, no less!)...
...been quoted in Seventeen magazine...
...won a Detroit Free Press excellence writing award for a short story I wrote...
...suffered mild MSG poisoning...
...been treated for three cysts...
...spent a week in Hawaii...

...gotten a chance to intern at 20th Century Fox in downtown Chicago...
...lost 3 grandparents...
...had my identity stolen and my credit marred...
...had my picture in the Detroit Free Press...
...attended a swanky party at the White House where I talked briefly to the Clintons...
...decided to become a Christian...
...lived on the beach for a summer...
...been stung by a jellyfish twice!...
...had a group of well-dressed guy friends surprise me with a serenade on my birthday...

...been passenger in a car accident where we rolled over 7 times and I was almost killed...
...been the recipient of 10 blood transfusions...
...healed completely (minus one slightly crooked pinkie finger) from 13 broken bones (including one in my neck)...
...had an actual panic attack...
...been greeted and surprised at the airport by a group of 40 cheering friends as I walked off the plane...
...received a standing ovation from 500 people for a speech I gave...
...been on my way to ask a guy out and was intercepted by my best friend, who told me that he also had feelings for me (in a truly dramatic romantic-comedy moment!)...
...earned a bachelors degree in Mechanical Engineering...

...had plastic surgery in 5 places (well, scar revision!)...
...been interviewed on a Detroit radio station...
...been an extra in a professional opera...
...been sued for something I didn’t do (and I won!)...
...been to Dollywood!...
...had one of my childhood friends pass away...
...been able to say “I love what I do for a living”...
...passed a kidney stone (whom I named Baxter)...

...took part in a Guinness Book of World Records record ("Most amount of wigs worn in one place"!)...
...bowled a 176...
...had a bruise/rash syndrome that no doctors at 2 different hospitals were able to diagnose...
...appeared in a television promo...
...been to the Emergency Room at least 12 times for my various ailments...
...had someone write an entire song just for me...
...successfully avoided getting a cavity...
...created a blog that people actually seem to like reading with 23,750 hits and counting (haha)...

Actually, all but a handful of those things happened within the last 13 years and, of course, this list is by no means exhaustive. I don’t know what you all think about it, but thinking through my life like that makes it seem really full. I mean, some of those things have had a bigger impact on my life than others, and some are far more tragic, but, taken all together, sometimes I actually realize that I’ve had some pretty unusual experiences for someone who is only 26-year-old!

I know it’s ridiculous at 26 to feel old (well, if any of my students are reading this, they may not agree!), but I think I can get caught up in that feeling that my most of my life has already passed and that makes me feel settled and older. But after thinking through the list above, I realized that I have yet to experience so much of what life has to offer-- and I mean exciting and happy things-- like getting married, having children, traveling overseas, a lifelong career. Heck, I haven’t even received a traffic ticket or finished writing a book or water skied or been on a game show! In some ways, despite all of the living I’ve done so far, my life hasn’t really started yet.

I think putting life into perspective has helped me not to concentrate so much on years passing, but on the adventures and drama to come. I am curious to see what my next lifelong list- the one I write in 13 or 26 years- entails. If this is what my life has been like so far, then I have a LOT of time over the next 50 (or more?) to experience life, right?

Anyway. There’s not much else to say, I suppose. To all of you who have shared in these experiences with me, or even those who have only read about them here, thanks for being, in whatever way, a part of my first 26 years. Life’s pretty crazy, and others make the ups and downs worth it. If any of you want to share your life lists, which I am sure are all just as unique as mine, with me, I’m here.