by Jenna Colley

My brother just finished his first year in law school, Cynthia is going to spend next year on a boat sailing form Alaska to Panama, Bobby is planning to overthrow the government, my best friend from high school just had a baby, Mike found God, and Kirsten, Maya, Jamie, and Sam are all falling in Love...and me. I've just spent two hours of my life watching Dallas reruns and painting my toenails.

While most everyone I know is out there living life, I have chosen to hole-up, pull down the shades, unplug the phone and begin drying up like a stick of beef jerky in a Louisiana convenience store. It's reevaluate my life time, and it's long overdue.

You may think these symptoms sound a little psycho slightly deranged but me: I think they're so abnormal that they make perfect sense. See, the fact is, I'm tired of leading a highly functional life. I'm tired of waking up at 6:00 a.m. to go to work, rushing to classes that aren't really teaching me anything ( on my lunch break of course), hauling ass back to work so that someone who is twenty years older and allot dumber than I am tell me what to do before I go home, do my homework and them complain about how I never have any free time. Frankly, I'm just tired of it all. So I've decided to change everything.

I will no longer put up with anyone's shit.

I wish there was a more polite word, but there really isn't so I'll continue. We all say this but no one ever takes it seriously. When someone cuts me off in a parking lot, I will get out and slash their tires. When a girl at one of those "made for anorexic 12-year olds" clothing stores in the mall asks me if I'm lost, I will give her a lecture on the importance of inner strength. When my family runs all over my mother on holiday, I will take her aside, break out the bourbon and crank-up the kareoke machine, while they stare in wonder as we sing "Beat It" at the top of our lungs during Christmas dinner. When some schmuck at one of the million University offices tells me that I'll just have to wait in line. I will take off my clothes and scream the words of "Eyes of Texas" until they listen to me.

I will put things in perspective.

I have found that this is the key to all things in life. When I begin to freak out over the fact that I have just failed my Spanish final, I will remind myself that I have failed all of the ones leading up to this one, therefore I am just keeping up tradition. When I begin to feel self-conscious at a party, I will remind myself of how once, two years ago, a guy crossed a room to talk to me, and we fell in love. When I am saddened by loneliness, I will remind myself that I have friends that are amazing that will be with me through it all. When I am broke and can't afford to buy a beer, I will remind myself that I'm alive and healthy.

I will not judge my worth by other people's standards.

This one has taken me forever to understand. From the time we are children we base our opinion of ourselves on those of others: our parents, our friends, our dates. Along the rocky road of adolescence and adulthood it is so damn easy to lose that thing in all of us that makes us strong. If we're lucky, something, or someone touches that place inside, if you've found it you know what I'm talking about, and we open ourselves to all of the love and hate in the world by seeing everything we can decide...consciously decide...what we want to be. I want to open that place and share. I don't want to be afraid of life.

I will be strong on my own.

I arrive now at the most important one, the hardest one. l It has taken my whole life to realize that life is too short and too precious to waste; that confidence in you own strength is everything. I remember the words my father told me once when I was just a child: "Remember who you are Jennifer, because that's the only thing that will get you through this world. Just remember who you are." As I sit here now, typing these words I think of those words. I think of how my life has changed, and how I have lost sight of who I really am, whatever that might have been I will be strong on my own, if only because I know that I have to.

So here I am shades pulled down, phone unplugged, TV on I lean back and finish up that last nail...lookin' good. I pop open another Diet Coke and laugh at just how funny life really is. I will make these changes, if I haven't already. I don't need to the change the worked, or raise a family, or find God, or write a book, or make a film, or fall in love. At least not today.