So it’s 1 AM and I’m listening to She & Him and playing on my computer. I have a deadline tomorrow for an article I’m writing for a local magazine. I’m not going to bed until I finish it…which of course directly correlates to why I’m being all introspective and bloggy and distracted. This is one of my first nights being the only one awake in this house. I’ll have you know that 12 people live here right now so the chances of me being the last one to bed are ya know…only 1 in 12. Anyway.

I just looked at this picture of my sister dressed up BEAUTIFULLY for a wedding she went to in Oxford, England this weekend. And I was reminded that we’re grownups. I was once again reminded that life has been happening. This is my life. I’m sitting in a cast house. My job is performing plays. I’m continually growing and learning new things.

Tonight I prayed out loud with some other people in a non-church, non-blessing food setting for the first time in a long time. I can’t even remember the last time I was involved in a situation like that where I was the one praying out loud. It may have happened on some tragic day or a wedding day. I don’t remember. That’s how long it’s been. It used to be a pretty standard part of my life. Safe to say it happened more than once every week 5+ years ago. Hmm.

I watched the film “An Education” again tonight. I was gunning for it when 4 of us girls went to the Redbox. I love this little monologue midway through the film:

My teacher says action is character. I think that means that if we never did anything we'd never be anybody. And I never did anything before I met you. And sometimes I think nobody ever did anything in this whole stupid country apart from you.

Sometimes if you delete certain people from life you find that the life sparkle is gone all of a sudden. You really only recognize it if you’ve ever had it. I know that’s sort of the inversion of what that quote says but nevertheless it’s true.

I realized today that I knew that I loved smart people—intellectual people who know a lot about things like politics and nuclear power and music history. But I kind of had this epiphany that when it comes to someone to spend my life with I’ve really got to have someone with a really high emotional intelligence too…somebody who feels really deeply and understands that part of me. I think if you don’t have that you can’t even really recognize it in other people. Maybe I’m speaking to a subject that I don’t know enough about to make definitive judgment calls on…I don’t know.

Alright, ok, I’m gonna finish this article now. By the way, I totally referenced OSHA in paragraph 4 and I’m personally impressed by that. Carry on…