Over what hill?

Not only is age ‘just a number’, I find that it is often a misleading gauge of anything and everything. In my foolish days [are they behind me yet?], I was led to believe that adults ‘over the hill’ led meaningless lives and yearn for younger and happier days [in between playing bingo and heckling at kids from their front porches]. Now, I know that this is a misperception created in my mind by Hallmark cards.

At one point or another, we all clue in to what we want to do with our time on earth. The lucky ones become in-tuned with the simple truths of life much earlier. An example of one is ‘your life is what you make of it’. It may sound plain, obvious, or even trite – but only to those who can’t appreciate the beauty of its simplicity.

‘Morning person’ is a term missing in my vocabulary [my alarm snooze button is almost worn right through]. As difficult as it is for me to wake up each morning, I welcome each day with open arms [after a banana muffin and a tall soy latte loaded with brown sugar]. Every day presents itself as a challenge and an opportunity to live my life the way I want and believe. There will certainly be rough patches here and there but as long as I stick to my guns and treat them as the difficult but necessary lessons that they are, there can be no bad days. Whatever comes my way, I cannot lose if I do my best to “Live in love. Live with integrity. Live for happiness.”

As time passes, we gain more opportunities to discover and live by new truths and secrets. Unless you give up when you hit 50, there is no going over any hill! Life is just going to get better as you get older. The bumps along the way will most likely be more complicated further down the road, but we’ll also be able to better appreciate the stretches of smooth sailing.

Misty Water-Coloured Memories...

... at Skule

I told Angela of the time my foot was run over by a car and she sympathized by sharing a story of her receiving a bruise when playing Ultimate Frisbee.

Going on ICQ or MSN the night before an assignment is due and scanning/sharing each other's answers [thanks Jeff!]

No one really fully understanding the exact definition of 90% confidence interval.

Using "entropy" in a punch line.

Instead of using a traditional weapon such as a gun, cannon, or tank when we were playing "war" in Separations lab, Irene jotted down the chemical formula H2SO4.

Getting caught playing "war" in Separations lab.

Getting into trouble with Irene and Cammie in Separations lab for carrying test tubes in lab coat pockets, holding them with tongs or by hand instead of using the supplied test tube holders.

Playing table tennis at the International Student Center everyday in first year.

Fudging data for lab reports.

Any stories involving Maira.

... with Tigers

Staying with Engerla's cousin's crazy roommate for NY Mimi 2004.

Being the only one who had to take a shower with a plastic bucket bought in NY Chinatown.

Going to Tammy's place and seeing a dozen ways to make fun of her height-deficiency: ballet bars as chin-up bars, a telephone set only one foot off the ground...

Brrrrrlatz.

Playing Asuka in rock-paper-scissors.

Being stunned on the court when watching Liv try to hit a ball off a block that was set against her teammate.

Cramming 10 girls in one hotel room in San Francisco.

Asuka mistakenly thinking she is taller than she really is. It must have been the flip-flops that Mimi was wearing. Nope, Asuka is just really short.

Asuka mistakenly thinking she is stronger than she really is. She was surprised when she challenged Engerla to an arm wrestling match and realized she could be beaten easily. Since she worked out twice a week, the loss simply made no sense to her.

The way Engerla laughs - by breathing very deeply.

The way Engerla tries to catch her breath when she is tired - by pulling her shirt over her nose and breathing very deeply. I wonder what happens if she tries to laugh and catch her breath at the same time...

Nearing the end of yet another summer

If the summer of 2004 was one of conflict, reflection, and growth, then the summer of 2005 shall be remembered as one of validation, serenity, and contentment. Looking back at my blog entries over the past year, it is easy to see the shift in my general attitude and outlook.

As incredible a life as I’ve had the great fortune of enjoying, I am eager awaiting what my future brings [while living and appreciating the present, of course]. It feels as though I’ve allowed myself to be taken downstream in an aimless canoe for the first two decades of my life. I finally learned how to use a paddle last year and have begun to explore the waters on my own terms this year.

By learning to love myself, I can leave my heart open to love and be loved. By being aware of my gifts and talents, I can value them and use them to heighten my life experiences. By seeing the kindness and thoughtfulness of those around me, I can appreciate them and reciprocate their sentiments. By learning about who I am, I can improve and better myself.

The sky is my limit. What’s yours?

Oh I have a personality all right

To follow my tradition of writing quasi-unrelated introductory paragraphs, I’d like to announce that I had quite a pleasant Sunday. I spent 3 hours outdoors scrimmaging at volleyball practice and 1.5 hours in the evening playing a tight softball game that had us crawling back in the game for an exciting win at the bottom of the last inning. I also watched The Fantastic 4 and had dinner with my volleyball friends. As exciting and complete a day as it sounds [and it was], that was not the most enjoyable part of yesterday.

I am not a morning person [statements do not come any truer], which is probably what made yesterday morning that much more pleasant. The weather was nice enough in the late morning to enjoy a cup of latte outdoors. If that weren’t fun enough, I had that latte while writing a test [I am not being sarcastic].

However, I am being slightly deceiving. It was a personality profile test [from the book Personality Plus] that uses four main groups to categorize your disposition: sanguine, choleric, melancholy, and phlegmatic. Here is a brief overview of each group:
Sanguine (popular) – lift of joy in times of trouble, word of wit when we’re weighted down, touch of innocence in a jaded era, lift of humor when we’re heavy hearted, creativity and charm to colour a drab day
Choleric (powerful) – firm control when others are losing theirs, cut of decision for foggy minds, grip of leadership to head us to the good, confidence to hold true in the face of ridicule, independence to stand alone and be counted
Melancholy (perfect) – depth to see into the heart and soul of life, artistic nature to appreciate the beauty of the world, ability to analyze and arrive at the proper solution, desire to do all things decently and in order
Phlegmatic (peaceful) – patience to put up with provokers, ability to listen while others have their say, compassion to comfort those hurting, will to live in such a way that even your enemies can’t find anything bad to say about you

Most people would have at least a little bit of each personality and may dominate in one or two. To determine your make-up, there are lists of adjectives you have to choose from to determine which most accurately describe you. You can then match those adjectives to the personality groups and tally how many traits you possess in each of those groups. The test pegged me at 20% sanguine, 35% choleric, 25% melancholy, and 20% phlegmatic.

I knew that I would score highest under ‘choleric’ but was surprised that my traits were as evenly distributed as they are. I expected something more like 10% sanguine, 50% choleric, 30% melancholy, 10% phlegmatic. This was confirmed when I read how the book described each of those personalities. The book seemed to be talking about me exclusively in chapters on ‘choleric’ and ‘melancholy’ while I had difficulty relating to those on ‘sanguine’ and ‘phlegmatic’.

Being the goal-oriented choleric and chart/graph/figures-loving melancholy freak that I am, I made a table listing all the traits that applied to me under each of the four groups. I then subdivided them in two subgroups: “things I’m proud of” and “things I’d like to work on” [I warned you that I was a freak]. Looking at the list today, I realized why I scored the way I did. If I took the test five years ago, I would have probably been deemed 75% choleric. As counter-intuitive as it sounds, I think it is my deeply choleric character that pushed me to be so well rounded today [now there’s a self-pat-on-the-back]. Choleric people are very goal-oriented. They think they are usually right and don’t have any weaknesses. But if they are convinced that there is an area that needs improvement, they will spring to action to better themselves. At one point, I realized how dominant my choleric personality was and made it my goal to develop the other personalities. Evidence of that is the time and effort I purposely made to become more friendly, creative, balanced, happy, and easy-going [all part of a sanguine and phlegmatic personality] this past year because I knew I needed to improve.

What made the test more fun [and it is hard to do because there aren’t very many things I enjoy more than constructive criticism] was doing it with someone else and seeing whether other people see you the way you see yourself.