I've Learned...

I turn 37 at the end of this workweek, and found myself awake until the wee hours of the morning ruminating on whatever lessons I might have come away with in my short life... and so far, I've learned that:

- a trip to the bathroom can sometimes yield happiness for one's spouse when he sees a new toy while waiting for you to come out;

- a side trip can prove more fruitful than the initially intended journey;

- long conversations with people who "get it" make time pass so quickly that you wonder where it's gone;

- disappointment will exist, no matter how you try to avoid it;

- you can't have your cake and eat it too... something will always give... the bigger the cake, the bigger the give;

- clean and freshly painted toenails can give joy beyond compare when having a bad day;

- if you use the right stuff in the first place, replacement won't be necessary;

- acting on one's impulses can prove right some of the time;

- great heartbreak can only follow a great love... and that great hate is usually prefaced by the same;

- you don't always get what you want, but pray that you always get what you need;

- there is beauty in unexpected places;

- there is such a thing as "enough";

- eventually, we all grow up and out of whatever we needed to grow up and out of;

- no one is pure evil;

- it would have been more prudent to wait, after all;

- every day is a gift to not be wasted doing absolutely nothing;

- nothing and no one is worth the loss of one's dignity and self-respect;

- after a break-up, you can't be friends... not really... not until time has healed every open wound that you'll then be able to face the once beloved without pain;

- a sticker can give a child more happiness than can be dreamed of;

- most of the time, there's nothing on television;

- that minding someone else's business can be counterproductive... I mean, we have our own business to mind;

- one well-chosen curse word can be far more perfect than a clean paragraph;

- it's smarter to start developing the mind while young; it has a longer shelf life than the body... long after my boobs have drooped to my waist, I'll still be able to ruminate on the changeable and changing meaning of life;

- it truly is better to have loved deeply and lost than to never have loved at all;

- there is nothing more peaceful than seeing your child sleep;

- you can really only be hurt by the ones you love and hate with a passion... those you're indifferent to can cause no suffering (unless they throw a beer bottle at your head);

- we as a country can overcome whatever is ailing us... the power does not lie in the hands of those seated in the halls of government, but in the hands of the constituency... once we realize this, only then can we start to build from the ground up;

- as a nation of 7,107 islands, if we each fix our own part of the island, we can then fix the nation;

- the truth about someone always... always comes out in the end;

- once you have a child, nothing else matters.