I just don't know...

I've come a long way, baby. When I think back to that dreary New Year's Eve and my resolution to have no resolution, I have to tell you that this is probably the farthest I've come in any year, ever. My room is still clean. I am much more organized. I almost feel like I've got it together, and let me tell you that's sort of a strange feeling for someone who has spent the majority of her life hurtling through in a chaotic blur. I hate to always quote one of my old college roommates, Reece, but he had a couple good quotes in the year we shared an apartment. One of them was, "I can't imagine you being reponsible for a child." That one makes me laugh still, because here's more than a little irony in the fact that for my career I help save childrens' lives on a regular basis, and am routinely responsible for their well-being. Yet I sort of agree with him still. I can't imagine having a child of my own. But I know that day will come, and I bet you anything I'll make a damn good mother. But I do wonder how you know when you're ready for that. Do you just start thinking about babies until it consumes your entire mind and you must produce/obtain one? Sometimes it seems like that must be the case, especially with some people I know. I really find it hard to believe that all of the sudden one day you wake up and realize that you have now reached the point where you are ready to be wholly responsible for the life of another human being. But that's what people will tell you when they have no better explanation. And I really do hate when people look at you knowingly (as in a discussion of marriage, say) and say smugly, "You'll just know." I didn't just know. And lots of people who'll tell you that will end up divorced. I hardly think, then, that they "just knew". I almost married a man who I am wholly incompatible with. It seems to me that you can create that "knowing" internally by wanting something badly enough to the point that you convince yourself of its reality. Anyway, I will spend the rest of my life trying to explain that to myself and the people who know me. It's like a big black splotch on my otherwise clean record. I screwed up in a BIG way, and I don't know if I'll ever fully understand why. But that close a call makes me distrust any internal voice that says, "Go ahead and do it, you just know it's right," because the way I see it, my right-meter must be a little off.
Anyway, only a handful of hours until I can start the rest of my life, be it in Italy or here in the lovely red America.

P.S. Did you hear Clinton's speech at the funeral of Coretta Scott King? It was really good, and it really made me wish he were back in office, especially when I compared it to Busch's humdrum typical unintelligent crap speech. Did you also notice how former President Jimmy Carter got his jab at Busch near the end of the speech? If you want to hear some of this, I've linked the page so you can find it easily and hear for yourself. Just go under Memorial Excerpts and click whichever one you want to hear first. Trust me, you'll notice the difference.