Making Lists

I've started every year since my freshman year of high school by making a list of about 10 questions. These questions are about school, my social life, musical goals...really everything that is making me feel apprehensive at that moment. Making these lists has become almost therapeutic for me; obviously there is no way I could possibly know the outcome of any of these situations, but condensing my uncertainties into a few simple and manageable questions makes it much easier to relax...and to imagine how much fun I could be having! Obviously after my first year of high school (and now my first year of college) I can make far more educated guesses and even know some of the answers in advance, but it has become a ritual of mine that I can't imagine giving up any time soon!

Looking back on my questions and answers is pretty hilarious too. The answers to my questions a year ago (entering my first year of college) changed dramatically from my first attempt at answering them (just after orientation) to the way I would answer them today with an entire year behind me...I guess that's just one of the many charms of life; it will always keep us guessing! Now, I'm still fairly self-conscious about my questions from more recent years, but I feel like enough time has passed that I can reveal what was making me nervous four years ago as a rising high school freshman...

1. Is Central [High School] any fun?
2. Do you have awesome friends?
3. What is band like?
4. Who do you sit with at lunch?
5. How long did it take you to find your way around?
6. Do you have a date for Homecoming?
7. Are IB (International Baccalaureate) classes hard?
8. How much work is math?

I've kept these lists in a series of notebooks (I don't know that I'd call them 'journals'...that sounds too Disney Channel for my life) where I comment privately about the world around me, what makes me happy, and of course the trials and tribulations of a teenage girl. Having just rediscovered my notebook from freshman year of high school, I also rediscovered a list of 10 band-related feats I wanted to accomplish before I die...

1. Kiss a [french] horn player
2. Date a drummer
3. Wave a lighter at a band concert
4. Go to a lunch party (the upperclassmen band geeks used to eat lunch in the music department hallway...it seemed really cool at the time)
5. Play every instrument in the ensemble
6. Conduct the ensemble I perform in
7. Start a band-wide inside joke
8. Be band president
9. Wear cork grease as chapstick
10. Kiss someone on a band trip

Well that's embarrassing...what's even more embarrassing is the number of those I have accomplished in the last five years. I'll leave that to your imagination in an attempt to retain some semblance of integrity!