Most of you to whom I provided this link tagged me in your 25 random things notes.  I wanted to do mine but not necessarily for 400 people, so I’m including them here, where only a handful of people, if any, visit, b/c I stopped blogging a while ago and never really broadcast that I started in the first place.  (might be more than you bargained for.  you are warned). Others I include because I think you CAN handle the truth and I want you to tell me your 25 things!  (By the way: I tried to email this from FB but my message was too long)

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1. I grew up in New Orleans and was dragged kicking and screaming to Houston a few weeks before my sophomore year.  I pretty much hated Houston all through high school but made some of closest friends, met my husband years later there, and looking back it was a good move.
2. I was always rebellious and questioned authority and spent more time trying to be cool than I did studying or participating in school activities.  I totally regret this.  If I could go back, I would take school seriously and participate in drama, dance and maybe soccer.  Instead, I smoked cigarettes, hung out, copied homework, talked on the phone, etc.
3. I went to a tiny women’s college in Boston few people have heard of, Simmons College.  I sort of got my act together there, academically, at least.  I was an English and Philosophy major, loved my classes, did most of the reading, etc.  But I also fell in with a druggie crowd and wasted a fair share of time, f’d up, indoors, “hanging out.” And though it was a women’s college, and empowering that way, most of my friends were BU boys who pretty much ruled the roost, which I also regret. I only keep in touch with a handful of people (or less) from college.
4. I had my first real boyfriend in college. After my heart was broken by my first non-real boyfriend, I never let it happen again (to my detriment) and kept a safe emotional distance from everyone I dated until I met my husband in 2000 and fell madly in love.
5. After graduating from college, I backpacked by myself around South America for 5 months, going to Ecuador, Colombia, Peru and Bolivia.  My Spanish was rudimentary at best but improved significantly while there.  This was a transformative experience for me.
6. I felt disoriented upon my return from South America.  It was weird that I hadn’t shared the experience with anyone.  I felt very alone but wanted to keep the traveler-observer vibe and moved into a room in a house with strangers in Cambridge. The house was eclectic to say the least.  One guy was dating a girl but then he started taking hormones (pre-op transsexual) and went from Abdu the guy to Amanda the girl (and then the couple were “lesbians”). The real girl in the couple was obese and then they started having threesomes with our other roommate, a 4’11” brilliant  Indian man named Basav.  And then there was the oddball agoraphobic gay computer programmer guy with pink hair who locked himself in his room smoking pot or eating pot brownies and listening to Israeli folk music who never unpacked his boxes for a year and explained that he just felt more comfortable with machines than people.  In any event,  I never judged but I was out of my element and began to get kind of alienated and depressed without even realizing it.
7. During my post-college Cambridge experience, I worked at a cool rock-bar, restaurant called the Middle East, died my hair pink, saw free shows all the time.  I also worked at a eastern philosophy, zen-type bookstore in Harvard Square, and had my own cable access show called “What’s Up Live.”  I wrote a lot of poetry and did spoken word incognito at a local venue that had a very active spoken word scene.  I was perhaps at my creative peak during this time.
8. I caravanned to Los Angeles in June 1997 with my best friend (who had been living in Idaho) and have been here ever since. I immediately fell in love with this city.  I started working fairly quickly as an Art Coordinator for music videos, commercials and print ads.  I was making money, traveling, employing a crew of hot guys and hanging out on set.  I never knew such a job was possible and I was euphoric.  My bf also worked as a set decorator and we often worked together on projects. It was the most fun job I’ve ever had, but I also dealt with a lot of entertainment egos and couldn’t shake the feeling that it wasn’t really “important” work or stable.
9. I went to law school at USC at the end of 1999. I had done well on the LSATs in 1995 and this was the last year I could use that same score, so I did it.  I LOVED law school, made a ton of close friends who I remain close to and had the best academic experience of my life.
10. I started working at a corporate law firm with a big salary upon graduation in 2002, thinking that I would just earn money to pay back loans and then do the “important” public interest work that is really my “thing.”
11. Although I’ve done a lot of pro bono work at my firm, I remain for all intents and purposes, a corporate lawyer (mostly IP litigation). It’s been the classic golden handcuff situation and sometimes I get really panicky that I am wasting my life and need to quit IMMEDIATELY but I just keep showing up and getting paid.  Still, I think I am on the last chapter here since I am not gunning for partner and they are not going to keep me around forever.  So for better or worse, I do not expect to be here one year from now. I think this is mostly a good thing b/c it will liberate me to think about what I really want to do.
12. I consider myself a closeted type B person in a sea of type As.  I feel undercover, incognito, out of my element. At the same time, I’ve gotten good at my job and I see that.  Still, it comes at some cost of stress, particularly since I have huge procrastination issues (Exh., A–this is what I’m doing now instead of the work I should be doing that I will likely end up needing to do later when I’m exhausted).  Also, I feel bursting with creative energy that I continue to stifle.
13. I met the absolute love of my life in 2000 and we married at the end of 2002.  JP is my best friend and soul mate.  I am still in awe at how lucky I am. We get along so well, have so much fun together and also work well together as partners and push each other to achieve our full potential.  We have such a positive, healthy relationship that really drives me forward in all respects. I cannot imagine anyone more perfect for me.
14. We had our son, Emilio, in March 2007.  The first 6 months, maybe even the first year, were really difficult for me.  I suffered from post partum depression and was TERRIFIED of being a mom, letting him down, something happening to him or me or JP.  I lived in an almost-constant state of fear and anxiety during this time, which scares me because I want to have another baby soon and hope that doesn’t happen again.  The next year has been amazing, though, so I think knowing that will help me with my second (if it’s meant to be).
15. I struggle with anxiety.  Since I’m not Type A, this is not the classic over-achiever anxiety but more the I-can’t-believe-we’re-all-going-to-die variety. I can get into modes where I feel cancer at every turn.  And what have I done with my life?  What of meaning?  I just can’t believe that we know this is all temporary and everyone walks around humdrum like it is okay that life is zooming past us and the end of the road is nothingness and it could happen at any minute.  How is that okay?  How will I explain this to my son?  How can I leave him?  How long do my parents have left?  My heart is accelerating even now so I better back off.  It’s all about keeping this panic at bay, for me.
16. My weight has always fluctuated by about 15 pounds and lately it’s gotten harder to lose that weight.  This is a source of stress for me, but I do feel committed to a life of healthy exercise and to being in my best shape EVER at 40.  That said, the fact that I’m just now ready to try to have another baby sort of throws a wrench in that plan in the short term future. I gained 50 pounds before and had a 10 pound baby and I’ve only recently lost all the weight (and had been heavier than I wanted to be before I had the baby).  I’m really going to try to be careful if I get pregnant again.
17. I feel like I’m in transition from being a New Orleans party girl with a drink and smoke in hand and a sober healthy living yoga girl.  I feel like I would like to be straight edge one day but I’m not there yet.  Both my parents are sober and I think it has been good for them.  I see my tendency to want to indulge in food, drink, “whatever else” as a weakness and I’m hoping that I will continue to be more healthy as I age.  Still–not there yet.
18. I can be confrontational.  I don’t like to start fights, certainly not with people I KNOW, but I don’t hesitate when I witness what I perceive to be an injustice.  I am also adamant about sticking up for my friends. I can’t stand when one friend talks about another friend in a way that is not loving and helpful (if also gossipy) but mean-spirited. I guess I am a loyal friend. On the negative side of this is my tendency towards wanting to pick fights, for instance, on facebook with people with different political views.
19. I am pretty ADD (without the hyperactivity).  I can be very spacey and not see things right in front of my face.  I’m often going back for things I left inside, making lists but losing the lists, etc.
20. I am very close to my parents and my brother (my only sibling).
21. I speak Spanish (my son’s first language is Spanish), but my accent is deceiving.  I might sound like I’m “fluent” but really I’m like a second-grader at best. I’ve never read a novel or anything in Spanish and I have not taken formal classes since high school (well I went to Spain for 6 weeks one summer in college and got credits there but copied homework and didn’t study). There are entire tenses I don’t know how to use and just avoid.  I want to take it to the next level.
22. I love photography.  I think I have a good eye, but I’m not technically adept so I’m sort of at a crossroads there.  The digital phenomena has actually been bad for me b/c now I don’t print photos and don’t have them in physical form.  I would love to have a photography show one day.  That is a dream. I want to take a photography class.
23. I also love writing, although I have done a lot less of it in the last 5 years or so.  I have been a journal-writer and a temporary blogger and love writing for my job, too . I also enjoy writing poetry, which may be my most natural format.  And I would love to try my hand at writing a play.  (my husband and I wrote a screenplay but it wasn’t really my favorite format, I think I would prefer theatre.)  Separately, I happen to be a natural rhymer.  I can sort of free-style rap.  Not like the big guys, but better than you’d expect for a 35 year old white woman.  I make up a ton of songs for my son and they’re not half bad.  They’re kind of complex with verses and melodies etc. I also love to sing.
24. I long to perform, to be on stage in some capacity, even in a local play or doing stand-up at a small venue.  In LA, everyone wants to act so I hate to even say that, but I would LOVE to act.  I’m not talking trying to be famous, but really being in a play would be awesome.
25. I believe we get what we expect, in kind of a quantum physics, holographic universe, law-of-attraction way (but I object to the materialist aspects of The Secret).  I’m interested in a broad variety of spiritual, metaphysical philosophies and am continuing to explore.  I want to develop a mediation practice and to intensify my yoga practice (which I absolutely love and which is probably my most natural athletic ability). I have a sense of spirituality, a belief in the interconnectedness of all things, a great respect for nature, a belief in something greater than ourselves, but I am at a crossroads.  I want to raise my children in some belief system but don’t really feel at home at church.  I’m not opposed to church and would actually like to go more often (for lack of other formal options) but I don’t really believe in the Christian story (though I embrace the ideals and sense of community).  So far, Buddhism has probably intrigued me the most.