Do not pass go. Do not collect $200.

I'm beginning to think that I fail at life.

It's all just a jumble of fails and mistakes and substantial days that could have mattered falling apart and landing together in one big box.  I should be able to pick out the details and be happy with them, but it's getting harder and harder. Maybe it's called depression, maybe it's being ungrateful, maybe I'm just falling behind. I'm not quite sure.

I've been forced to re-evaluate my life in light of my upcoming birthday.  A birthday that I have, in all honesty, been planning for 8 years.  A birthday that I've had far more interest in over the course of my life than even throwing a wedding.  I had always planned on eloping, and saving money to throw a party for this particular day.

But, surprise surprise, it's not happening.  I had planned on a trip, a party, and a fabulous new dress. That was before life became a game of Monopoly; holding the right cards, holding the wrong cards, winning, losing, bankers taking all your money, in a game that never ends.  Now I find myself considering the pros and cons of scraping together enough spare cash to go see a movie.  Maybe go out to dinner with all of my friends -except that they can't afford to go out to dinner anymore than I can, and I feel weird anyways asking them to pay their own way.  Maybe I shouldn't, but I do.

Let me explain:

I always felt that this particular birthday would be a grand opening into a brand new, accomplished, fashionable, confident, happy, adult me.  Now looking back, this seems to be rather a barbie reality instead of one that I can reach. But that isn't going to stop me from trying.  I will be try to be happy.  I will try to look good.  I will try to have fun.  I will try to not be disappointed in myself.  Now I will try to take the "try" out of all of those sentences, that would make everything much better.

So here I am, working.  Wondering if I can afford $60.00 on a sparkly, sophisticated new party dress, or whether it would just be just as memorable to go through my storage boxes and pull out an old prom dress from high school and see if it still fits.  It shouldn't be such a depressing thought, but it is.

And so I don't know what will happen, I just might end up renting a movie and sitting inside with a container of cool whip and a can of pringles, bringing in the new me in an enviable fashion.  Wish me luck.

Love,
Alice