Seventeen epiphanies and a slightly disjointed blog

I haven’t blogged for a long time. It’s funny, because I think so often about things I should blog. They’re brilliant ideas too. Believe me.
I just got back from Thanksgiving break when I spent a week at home with my family. Yes, it was great, thank you for asking. There’s something about getting away from life as usual that allows you to sort through the various departments of your life and feel a desire to change. We should all take vacations. It’s good for you.
I had seventeen epiphanies during my sojourn in Sacramento. If you ask me what they were, I will not be able to tell you. They keep coming back to me when I’m reminded of something I figured out or some task I have resolved to do.
One such epiphany was of the “Carpe Diem” variety and is nothing we haven’t heard before. Still, it’s stuck with me this long and I’m determined not to let its idealistic little self out of my grasp. This new zest for life materialized out of reading two fantastic books: The Road and A Thousand Splendid Suns. In putting myself into the world of these stories, I realized that if each day may be your last or if the bombs may wipe you out at any moment, there’s no reason to hesitate. No, this isn’t an excuse for impetuous and irresponsible behavior. Rather, it’s an antidote to the undesirable aspects of my analytical personality. So, you know, the basics: tell your mom you love her, ask out the girl of your dreams, apply for the program you don’t think you’ll get into, etc. Like I said, we’ve heard it all before.
I’ve noticed some things about myself as well. I don’t like dessert much. I usually am peer pressured into eating it, but I’m maverick enough (thank you, Sarah Palin for stealing my word) to order fries at an ice cream parlor and otherwise break with accepted dessert protocol. Also, I have learned that I should never commit to writing more than two major projects at the same time. Unless there’s money. And I can drop the pesky classes that require work that seems irrelevant to my education. But that’s another blog entirely.
I need to get over my dream of being an actor. I’ve made choices that have started me on a different path and I know that I’m doing the right thing and headed in the right direction. Good. Still, all it takes is the sight of an audition notice or watching a top-notch performance to reawaken the little kid inside of me who wants to move to New York and make it big on Broadway. Perhaps I should stop doing my indulgent acting gigs that keep that unhealthy little dream alive. Or perhaps I need to make room for it somewhere; it’s obviously important to me.
There are some people who just irritate me. They’ve all earned this special place in my heart, make no mistake about it. What’s funny is the way I react to certain things they do (jokes made, Facebook status updates, etc.) because I have labeled them as annoying. I roll my eyes and chastise myself for having such uncharitable thoughts, but I’m sure if someone outside the “annoying box” did the same thing, I would react in a totally different way. Most interestingly, perhaps, I wonder if I have been put in this box by anyone I know and I am almost certain I have. There isn’t much I can do about this. So I don’t think too much about it.
Almost every day I drive past a sign advertising a florist’s shop where you can buy a dozen roses for $9.98. The price hasn’t changed since I first arrived in Provo and I’m a little ashamed to say that it makes me feel a little wistful when I see it. I think of who I might eventually buy those roses for. It’s been such a long time coming, I’ve got to make it count when it finally happens. And I firmly believe that it will. Maybe that’s because not believing won’t get me anywhere and Logical Matthew has figured that out. But I believe it nonetheless. I can find someone to take a dozen roses to. And if she knows me, she’ll know I wasn’t bargain hunting, but that for a reluctantly optimistic flower buyer, she has finally arrived. I hope she knows someone is waiting for her. And I hope she hurries up and gets here.