As I approached my 28th Birthday, there were several times when I caught myself thinking of all the things I have yet to accomplish. In fact, I spent the last few weeks laying in bed at night freaking out because I’m STILL not where I thought I would be in my life. I don’t have the ideal income, I’m not completely self reliant, I drink entirely too much, I still have a bit of an inferiority complex, I’ve quit going to the gym daily, and I’ve found that I occasionally still slip back into old bad habits.

Today, though, I made a decision. I’m not sure whether or not it’s because I’ve been clear headed and sober for 48 hours, but while I was on the treadmill today, thoughts began pouring out of my brain before the blaring sound of LCD Soundsystem on my ipod could block them out.

I’m ready to quit focusing on all that I haven’t achieved. I’m ready quit putting myself down for lapses in judgment that I’ve made in the past. I’m ready to stop dwelling on all of my forgotten goals, and I’m ready to stop pretending that I can just sit here idle and the world will magically fix my problems.It’s time to take action.

First I want to congratulate myself on what I have achieved in the past year. Twenty-seven may have not been the best year of my life, but I think I’ve endured a lot of changes, some of which have helped me become a stronger person.

During my 27th year I changed jobs. I changed houses, changed cities, and changed roommates. I watched my family fall apart and had to learn to play the role of an adult with my parents. I helped to bring my family back together. I let go of relationships and learned that I deserve respect from others and from myself. I’ve had arguments with close friends and am learning how to compromise. I became a blogger and realized though at times I may go a little too far, I enjoy putting myself out there and love to write like no one’s reading. I’ve made new friends and reconnected with old ones… and I’m starting to understand the importance of friendship and communication.

But if 27 was a year of change, I think 28 needs to be the year of growth. I’ve decided to set some goals for myself, but I’m also not going to be too hard on myself ifI don’t meet them all.. because after all, I’m not perfect.

I want to be more reliable, and in turn not take people for granted.

A close friend of mine told me the other day that in just the last two months she has noticed that I am not near as flaky as I used to be. She told me that she had started to hold me more accountable to things that I say I will do… and while on one hand that scares the bejeezus out of me… it also made me proud. I used to enjoy being the person that no one could count on. Not because I didn’t want people to like me, but because I was lazy and wanted to be able to flake out of situations without people being surprised. For a long time I didn’t mind when people said, “Oh that’s just Carissa.. she probably just forgot.” After years of this behavior I’m sure that people have just come to assume that I’ll be the one who forgets to RSVP to weddings. People have come to expect that I’ll be the one who will arrive 2 hours late to the party, if I even show at all. I don’t know how I went so long without caring that I was “that” girl. I have come to realize lately that I rather enjoy it when people can count on me. It makes people respect me, and want to behave the same way in return. I plan on making 28 the year that people can count on me for a change.

I want to choose my battles… but also my apologies.

I’m not one to argue much with friends. I don’t like confrontation, but even more than that- I’ve always had a difficult time standing up for myself. Over the last few years I feel that I’ve made some head way in that regard. I’ve begun to feel passionate about my stance on my ideas and care a little more about sticking up for them, and I believe that this is a positive change. However, I’ve gotten myself in a few situations where I’ve gotten involved and I probably shouldn’t have.. It’s good to share opinions, but just like momma always said (your mom, not mine) there are times when things are best left unsaid. Sometimes it’s best to just let things play out and I think it’s important for me to understand that time is the best cure for some circumstances.

That being said, I still feel that one of my greatest weaknesses is how quickly I am to take the blame…. to say “I’m sorry.” I’m not saying that I shouldn’t apologize when I am at fault, but I should definitely recognize the times when I’m not. I spend entirely too much time feeling guilty over situations that I have absolutely no control over. I can’t be there for everyone all the time. It’s not my fault if my friend’s argue with each other, or if their relationships don’t work out. I can’t feel bad about not being able to be at two places at once. I can sympathize with situations, but I can’t always do something about them, and I need to learn to be OK with that.

I want to fill my time with things that make me happy, find new hobbies and get more involved with old ones.

I have a lot of passion for a lot of different things, but I feel like lately I’ve let a lot of them fall by the wayside. I want to spend this year getting back involved in the things I love. I want to perform more, and not be afraid to try new things. I want to improve my writing, and do it more often. I want to take advantage of opportunities. I want to embrace my talents and start looking to using them for my future. I want to join my sister on a birding adventure, ride the bike that has been sitting in my garage for 4 months, and start swimming again. I want to take one of the art classes in my neighborhood that I’ve looked into 5 times but never thought I had the time for. I want to meet some of you people and have some good conversation. I JUST WANT TO DANCE!

I want to live a healthier lifestyle, both physically and mentally… have respect for myself and treat my body like the temple that it is. Basically I want to be the best me.

When people I know see that I’ve lost over a 100 lbs, a lot of people assume that I am the epitome of good health, that I must have have mastered self control.  This couldn’t be further from the truth. Sure there are days, even consecutive weeks when I will work out 5 days a week, watch my portions, and count calories. But there are also days where I am so terrified that I will gain weight, that I will consume almost nothing so that I can drink a bottle of wine at night. There are other days where I will completely jump the wagon and not even care that I just ate an entire weeks worth of Chinese food, but will stress about it for days after. I don’t want to be this person anymore. I know this is something that I’ll probably always struggle with, but I want to find some consistency. My healthiest months are the ones where I am the most happy, and I want to feel that way all the time. I don’t want to be the kind of person who is always concerned about my appearance, or that people are going to judge me…. and for the most part I’m not. I want to get to the point (and some days I’m there) where I’m not concerned if I gain a few lbs, where I know that I will still feel comfortable and confident in my body no matter what size I am.

I want to stop smoking, and I’m only 2 days in but I think I can do this. I want to cut down on drinking significantly, so that I can remember the good times… so that I can enjoy the quality of my life. I want to brush my teeth every night and go to sleep early enough so that every once in a while I can get up and enjoy a sunrise walk.

I want to be more confident in myself. Sometimes I think I was more confident when I was bigger, probably because I had to be. I want to be able to walk into a room and KNOW that I’m fabulous, even if other people may not agree.

I don’t want to be so insecure in my relationships. I want to trust. I want to have more faith in people and human kind as a whole. I want to have the same faith in myself as I think some people have in me.

I want to enjoy everyday of 28, and not get bogged down by the little things. I want to make the most of this wonderful, wonderful life.

Thanks for sticking with me through 27, and through this ridiculously sappy post. Even this girl gets sappy every once in a while. I LOVE YOUR FACE!

Lilu is out of town for a while, but she has provided us with a series of very special TMI Thursday post secret posts. Make sure to check them out…. And for more TMI than you could ever imagine, check out her TMI archives!

I’m doing TMI a little different this week. I have a friend “Moops” who has asked several times for me to talk about him on my blog.

Well sir, I’ll do better than that. You have officially been email roasted. TMI Thursday style.

The following are emails that I copied straight from an email  conversation that happened yesterday afternoon.

I wrote the first email to a group of my friends when I realized I was having a difficult time coming up with a post for today. Moops spent the better part of the afternoon traveling all over the country for work, so didn’t get to check his email until the damage had been done.

Luckily, he’s a good sport. (I hope.)

Hey friends,

Moops has been wanting me to talk about him in my blog for a while… As I am completely brain dead today,I was thinking that you guys could help me out with thinking of a good story.

I know there must be many stories out there that I could tell that would be considered TMI about our friend in question.

The first one that first comes to mind…

Remember when we were calmly talking in the living room, and out of nowhere Moops reached down his pants, into his butt hole and then proceeded to stick his fingers in my mouth???! Just because ” he had an urge!!!”

I almost had to kill myself by ingesting bleach.

I got him back on the river trip though. heeeheehehee

You got anything better?

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RE: TMI

FROM: SCUBA

This happened,

Outside the Coventry Apts. Justin met our across the hall neighbors in his tighty whitees.  He then helped the girl carry groceries from her car up flight of stairs in his undees.  He then slipped on the very top concrete stair and all of the groceries went flying out of the sack.  He was bleeding and scrounging for groceries in front of our new girl neighbor in his undees.  Her boyfriend then shows up as this is going on.

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RE:TMI

FROM: CARISSA JADE

Orrrr……….Maybe I should switch gears and tell about the time Scuba pooed his pants. I was such a nice friend and told him I would do his laundry for him. I almost died when I saw the skid lake underwear in the laundry basket.

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RE: TMI

FROM: LA

How about the time Moops puked on my couch then had to be taken to bed? Fast forward three hours and he comes storming down the stairs yelling at me me. Upon his return back up the stairs he proceeds to trip and stumble back down to the bottom. To top it off, he jumps up, glares and points his finger at me and says, “Yoooooooouuuuuuu”!

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RE: TMI

FROM: KT

I have a quick couple…

How about the time Moops decided to tell us about his love for couches. He loves them so much that he use to have sex with them, sad but true. Moops use to masturbate by inserting his junk between couch cushions and go to town!

Or how bout the time we went to we walked into an apt. party of people we didn’t even know and Moops drank too much and as usual stripped down to his tightee whitees and the people were so put off they asked us to leave. We do and Moops begins to laugh. Of course we ask “what are you laughing at?” He then pulls out the tube of toothpaste he was so proud to have stolen. His grand revenge for getting kicked out was stealing toothpaste…

Then there is the time that Moops really impressed me. I had just moved in below him and had spoken with him a few times. My roommates were out so I went to go say hi. Moops opens the door and is unquestionably shit faced. We are watching T.V. and I’m telling him a story when he stops me and says “hold on.” He then leans over and pukes the smelliest blach puke onto his carpet, nearly getting it on his boy dog “Jager.” When done he looks at me and says “ok, go on.” Without blinking an eye! Bless his heart!

And then of course there is the time that he asked my somewhat crazy ex-bff to trim his pubes. She then convinces him that he should be blind folded for the event. She did this so pictures could be taken without him knowing. Blindfolded, naked, and holding a beer, Moops let this crazy woman near his manhood with a pair of scissors in her hand! Don’t worry she didn’t hurt him, she just trimmed, but it did make for interesting pics….

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RE:TMI

FROM: CARISSA JADE

HAHAHA I forgot about some of these! Speaking of the puking (not that there aren’t already enough puking stories) I just remembered about the time that I woke up to find a pile of puke at the foot of my bed. That fool woke up in the middle of the night, stuck his head over the foot of the bed, and then straight up went back to sleep.

The funny thing about that night that he stole the toothpaste, is that I’m pretty sure that was the same night we may or may not have dipped someone’s toothbrush and razors into the toilet. Oops.

Oh. And my favorite… (which really needs it’s own post) The night he peed my bed, thank goodness I was on the futon that night (poor shae) That wasn’t really even the bad part. He took the down comforter home and promised to wash it. Three weeks later I go to his loft and that thing was was in his closet with all the other “clean” blankets… and sure nufff …it had never been washed.

And KT. When you get a chance, you must send me those pube cutting pics. I have no idea what happened to my copy. I know it was in my glove compartment for a while- though I have absolutely no idea as to why…

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RE:TMI

FROM: MOOPS

Wow, all of this makes me sound like a really great guy!  I’ll get abnoxiously drunk, puke, piss your bed, might fuck your couch and I might ask you to get some of those hard to reach pubes.  I want to hang out with me!!

Scuba,  speaking of fucking things this one is for you…

I believe this story epitomizes TMI.  This came out of one of those story telling sessions where everyone was boozed up enough to share stories from their sexual past, the story didn’t necessarily have to involve another person, solo acts were admissible.  I’m on a plane and I don’t want the guy next to me to see what I’m writing so I have to make it quick.

So it begins, Scuba, the horny young thing that he was went about the house looking for objects he could have intercourse with, nothing too disturbing or out of the ordinary yet, right?  On his quest for pleasure a furry young thing catches his eye, why of course, what better sexual companion than your favorite over stuffed teddy bear (it might have been a panda).  But hmmm, how to make this lustful encounter logistically possible?  Cut a hole in it!  With near surgical precision (I’m sure) Scuba proceeds to cut a hole ample enough to receive his penis.  Then,  he fucked the teddy bear.

The funniest part is that his mom found the stuffing from the procedure; he told her that a kid down the street went into a rage and stabbed his bear.  So to this day if that neighbor kid is ever mentioned his mom says something to the effect of “ oh that so and so , he’s the one who stabbed your poor teddy.”

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RE: TMI

FROM: KT

It was a cow and he shared that story the same night you shared you love for couch cushions

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RE: TMI

FROM: CARISSA JADE

hahaha ok, thanks guys. I’m gonna have to use all of this…

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Oh yes, in case you were wondering… my friends definitely put the ass in class. Have a wonderful day!

Enjoy.

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