The "What Are Your Life Plans?" Answer

People keep asking me what my plans are beyond my jobs at a natural foods grocery store (my scene) and coaching high school girls' rowing. Here's what I always end up thinking:

To experience all that I encounter and desire to try. To be challenged to try new things and listen to people that I don't understand and really hear them out. Wish for greater things than what's in front of me everyday and everyday make a small effort to make those things a reality in the long run. To keep learning from my mistakes. To tell others I love them and they are great and to keep my mouth shut and try to appreciate the people who I might not feel that way about. To do wonderful things that make me feel alive and free and wouldn't regret doing them even if I died in those moments.

To feel everything, and remember you can only know what it's like to feel high when you've felt low and what softness is when you've felt the rough. To feel the sun on my face almost everyday instead of the grey skies (so get out of this area).

To enjoy lace underwear, heels, cupcakes and a cute dress. To get the thrill from 100mph on motorcycle, the pleasure of driving a truck with the windows down in the summer, and the satisfaction of changing my own oil and manning a drill. I will deeply and passionately kiss someone whom I love to their bones. To have someone that will be the only one I'll always know and have their back and them have mine. To set an example that life isn't perfect but being yourself is a great way to go about it. To always speed up through puddles and run and jump off of docks into the lake. Fall asleep under the multitudes of endless stars and see the shapes in the darkness. To never stop learning and therefore never really get older. To have kids that are bold and grow up in a house where their parents are in love with one another and consider it a delight to show them the world and its workings.

To be comfortable in my own skin. Give without expecting returns whether or not it has always been done unto me. To understand that just because someone hasn't taken time to learn the proper usage of the word "to" and "too" does not mean they're lazy because I really tried to learn my times tables and sometimes shit just isn't meant to happen. Hear the most beautiful sounds ears can hear like a Harley engine and the water lapping the shore at night. Smell glorious things like oil on a man's skin and the blossoms on cherry trees in the morning and lady of the night in the evening. See the brilliance of a sunset over a canyon and realizing it is no less incredible than the look of love in someone's eyes for something. To taste the best of the best and still love burritos the most.

Live without regrets and remember that fear is often simply one's heart acting out feelings of uncertain outcomes or the repeat of previous ones but neither is necessarily a cause to not dive in.

To be able to stand before God whenever that moment comes and say, "Thanks! It had its ups and downs, but that was a great run. What's next?"