Trying to define yourself is like trying to bite your own teeth.

So one of the things that has been on the forefront of my mind lately is how we define ourselves. Particularly, how we define our lives in terms of our relationships to others. It seems that we are always in a rush to define ourselves in terms of relationship and/or careers. When people ask us who we are we often rush to the obvious choices For example: " I am an accountant" or "I am _______'s girlfriend/wife/ fiance" Do they really define who we are as people? Do these definitions of ourselves somehow make us feel like we are sucessful? Have you ever stopped to think about how many of these types of definitions define you?
Here are mine:
I am Cathe and Garys daughter
I am Toni, Rachel, and Micheles best friend
I am Saras roomate and friend
I am an accountant at a big 4 firm
I am a UD college graduate
I am a woman
I am Brendan's sister
I am from Rochester
I am living in Philadelphia
I am 23
I am Italian and Lithuanian

Why is there such a push to define ourselves in our relation to others? What are your thoughts - & what defines you?

Job Market 2009

Thought this video was funny, yet scarily true.

Slow Dance

The alarm clock goes off, late again, racing to catch the train. Get off the train join the sea of people racing for the doors of the train station. Run across the busy street, and through the glass doors before the revolving door hits me. Race to the elevator just before the door shuts, almost spill my coffee as my bag slips off my shoulder then I arrive.. 9 am. Race to finish the last bit of work I should have done the night before, before I race to the meeting I have in 10 minutes. Back to work, is it lunchtime yet?? Is this day alnost over. Finally 6 pm. Race home to make dinner, cram in some studying, and a few chores before bed. Get in bed, my mind racing through tomorrows tasks as I drift off to sleep. 6 am the alarm goes off and I repeat the above cycle.

So often I find myself racing from one thing to the next.. just wishing the day away. How has it come to be that I spend most of the week wishing it away - lost in dreams about the weekend? It feels like lately I pretty much live for Saturday. Why Saturday? Well Saturday is the best day of the week. Think about it, you wake up on Saturday and there is nothing you HAVE to do, the day is pure, its a clean slate. It can be anything you want it to to be - endless possibility lies in Saturday. I cant help but think though that while we all want to get done with the work week and onto the weekend, its sort of sad how we spend 5/7 days in a week racing our lives away from one mundane task to the next. If you think about it in terms of a year that would be 260 out of 365 days in which we wish we were somewhere else -- broken down even further that is 374,400 minutes per year spent waiting for saturday. Over a lifetime of the average working person that equates to 16,099,200 minutes spent waiting for the weekend.

I think that sometimes we get so caught up in the race of life, that we forget to make the moment count. Enjoy the little things -- and not take one day (even a day at work) for granted. Instead of racing through the commute -- lost in your own world. Stop: smile at the person next to you on your way out of the train station. Stop to smell the flowers sold by the crazy old woman on the street corner. Take 5 extra minutes and grab the coffee that you really wanted but convinced your self you didnt have time to get. All I know is that - I need to slow down - I just cant justify spending 374,400 minutes a year feeling like I'm waiting for saturday. Below is one of my favorite poems.. keep this in mind the next time you find yourself wishing for Saturday and racing through the day:

S L O W D A N C E:
Have you ever watched kids on a merry-go-round?
Or listened to the rain slapping on the ground?
Ever followed a butterfly's erratic flight
Or gazed at the sun into the fading night?
You better slow down
Don't dance so fast
Time is short
The music won't last
Do you run through each day on the fly
When you ask "How are you?"do you hear the reply?'
When the day is done,do you lie in your bed
With the next hundred chores
running through your head?
You'd better slow down
Don't dance so fast
Time is short
The music won't last
Ever told your child,We'll do it tomorrow
And in your haste, not see his sorrow?
Ever lost touch,Let a good friendship die
Cause you never had time to call and say "Hi"?
You'd better slow down
Don't dance so fast
Time is short
The music won't last
When you run so fast to get somewhere
You miss half the fun of getting there.
When you worry and hurry through your day,
It is like an unopened gift....Thrown away...
Life is not a race.
Do take it slower
Hear the music Before the song is over

Mind wandering on the train...

I was sitting on the train today listening to my IPOD as per the usual commute and I took notice of a billboard outside the window as the train passed by. The billboard simply said "where are you going?" I dont know it if was the song that was playing, or the fact that its been along time since I've been home, but that billboard prompted me to start thinking about where I've been, and the road I've taken to get to where I am today. Its simple really, one choice you make can change the whole path of your life. But the crazy part is that change is so slow; your life changes so slightly each day that you dont really realize that anything is different it until you start looking back on where you have been and you realize how different it is from where you started. Its funny, I look back to where I thought you would be at this point in your life - and it is not where I expected to be at all.

Some days I just wake up in Philly, and I cant believe that I live here. Me? Philadelphia? Growing up everyone (including myself) thought that I would never leave Rochester, my family, my home. Yet somehow life lead me here and life is turning out different - better then I expected.

I used to be afraid of so many things..That I'd never grow up.That I'd be trapped in the same place for all eternity. That my dreams would forever be shy of my reach. It's true what they say. Time plays tricks on you. One day you're dreaming, the next your dream has become your reality and now that this scared little girl no longer follows me wherever I go, I miss her. I do. 'Cause there are things I wanna tell her-- to relax, to lighten up, that it is all going to be ok. I want her to know that meeting people who like you, who understand you, who actually accept you for who you are, will become an increasingly rare occurrence and these people, Toni, Michele, Rachel, Megan, Joe, Meg, Dan, the people from my past past have contributed to who I am, they are with me wherever I go, and as history gets rewritten in small ways with each passing day, my love for them only grows. Because the truth is... growing up together was the best of times. Mistakes were made, hearts were broken, harsh lessons learned, but all of that has receded into fond memory now. How does it happen? Why are we so quick to forget the bad and romanticize the good? Maybe it's because we need to believe that the time we spent together actually meant something, that we were there for each other in a time in our lives that defined us all, a time in our lives that we will never forget.

And as my life here continues to take me farther and farther from the little girl I used to be, I cant help but wonder. "Where am I going?"

When autumn comes, it doesnt ask, it just walks in where it left you last..

Happy Fall!!!!!

 Fall honestly is one of my favorite times of the year. Its relaxing.. summers events are over, and its just a great time to enjoy the simple things. Some of my favorite things to do during the fall are making a bon fire, sitting outside in the cool weather, yet keeping warm by the fire; haunted hayrides; carving pumpkins etc.  I'm looking forward to this lull in excitement actually before busy season starts. I just need some time to collect my life before working day and night commences.

Its funny, when I was a kid, my parents would take me to carve pumpkins, and the haunted Halloween stuff, and I never really appreciated it the way that I do now. I sort of just took all that stuff for granted. Now, its nice once and a while to do things that don't end in being drunk in a crowded bar. Sometimes I think we tend to forget how much fun that kind of stuff can be when we get caught up in the bar scene. Anyways, I hope that I can get a few fall activities in before I get busy. 

Still studying, but I'm sick of talking about it. Next exam Oct 30, wish me luck!

Motivation??!

 

It has been a while since my last post, good news though I passed another exam!!!!! That means just ONE MORE TO GO!! I have been procrastinating on studying the last few days. Its almost as if the thought of taking this exam for the FOURTH time is just overwhelming me to the point where I cant even focus. I know that I need to buckle down and get this done, but there are so many things that I would rather be doing! 

This week has been an eternity, I'm not really sure why - but just very slow moving. I am excited for the weekend, at it holds the promise of some fun with friends, but always dread it too because that just means another Monday. 

On a side note, I really miss Toni and Michele, I wish I had more time to be able to keep in contact with them, but we are all so busy that the days just pass and before I know it it has been forever since we've seen or talked to eachother. I think that it is one of those things though, that no matter how long its been since you've seen them, you just pick off where you left off, or atleast I hope it is. 

I hope the days come easy and the moments pass S L O W..

Let me just start out by saying this weekend went way to fast, I am so sad that it is sunday. This weekend Manayunk hosted the Redbull Soapbox Derby. The derby went down Lyceum and Levering St., nicknamed "the wall" in Manayunk due to its steapness. Sara and I decided to host a party at our house as a pregame to the race which started at 1pm. All week we were worrying about the weather for our party because Hurricane Hanna was set to dump rain on Manayunk just in time for the race. 

Sure enough, just in time for our party, the rain started pouring. Luckily, our friends are pretty tough, and braved the weather anyways. About 20 people came and we had such a great time! Then we headed to the race. By this point, "its raining" would have been an understatement, buckets of water were pouring out of the sky.  After 2 races we decided to head to Kildares to get some drinks and get dry. We ended up partying there till about 5 pm then we headed home and crashed. 

This weekend got me thinking about how great my life has gotten. I looked around at my party and realized how many great people I have met in Manayunk in the last year. I am so lucky to have such great friends and found a place that makes life fun - despite being in the "real world". Going to the race and partying all day with my friends reminded me to keep the day to day problems in perspective.  And reminded me that I have all anyone needs - a great family, and great friends. Thats all for now.