Memorable Moments

So I've told many people that I think we all have several moments/events in our lives that change us forever. I mean, clearly tons of people believe that too. But I guess where I differ, is that I think some of those moments may be small, even seemingly insignificant. And they can happen over the entire course of your life. I have the anniversary of a very sad and big one coming up next month so I've started thinking about all of them. Here are just a few.

Event: Age 7- I started taking dance classes
Impact? My father is a remarkably talented musician and I never had any desire to play an instrument. Dance became my way of expressing my art. To be fair, I've never been anywhere close to a professional grade dancer, but my love of the art form and music in general continuously gives me a feeling of being PRESENT. Like thru music, I can feel, touch, smell and taste the moment. And that's glorious.

Event: 5th Grade- I asked a boy to fifth grade prom and he said yes
Impact? That boy would become part of my first epic love story that would span well over a decade. Even better, that boy would become and remain half of an epic friendship.
Funny Side Note: He wanted to go with another girl.

Event 6th Grade - I randomly declared to anyone who would listen that I planned to go to a particular boarding school... not knowing one thing about it.
Impact? My older brother attended the same school for a year. I honestly have no idea why I made the decision to go, but once I said it in 6th grade, I couldn't go back on my word. And I didn't. I attended the school, loved it, and never regretted one minute of the education, experience or friends I picked up along the way.
Funny Side Note: The first time I saw the campus of my new high school was literally the day I arrived to move in.
Funnier Side Note: My application, which I eventually was able to see senior year, was written in blue ink, black ink and pencil. I have NO idea how I managed to scrap through.

Event: 7th Grade: I decided to take drama as my elective
Impact? I found my voice in this class. To this day, the fact that I can project my voice clearly across entire rooms can be attributed to Ms. G. Also, I regularly made an ass out of myself and its been recorded. This equals endless joy in my "old fart" age.

Event: 7th Grade- I started to adamantly correct teachers and classmates on the pronunciation of my name.
Impact? As I've mentioned before, I love my name. And the common pronunciation of it is not the one i use. I've said before that I'll refer to myself in this blog as Dulciña pronounced Dool-Seen-Ya. Non Latin speaking people would probably pronounce it Dull-Seen-Nah. It's the same idea for my real name, i know I'm pronouncing it the way it should be, but people will consistently pronounce it otherwise. By stepping up and correcting people, I think I started to claim my individuality. It was a powerful thing.
Funny Side Note: I have friends from before 7th grade who are allowed to pronounce my name wrong via the grandfather clause. Same friends, however, introduce me to new people with the right pronunciation.

Event: 11th Grade- I spent 10 weeks in Spain.
Impact? This was the first time I crossed an ocean. My wanderlust was born. Also, my love affair with the Spanish language was solidified.

Event:  February 24th, 2000. A close friend of mine committed suicide.
Impact? This changed my entire world and still resonates to this day. It took me almost two years to make any new close friends. I imagine I'll write about this more at some point in the future, because whenever I think about life changing moments, this is the very first one that comes to mind.

Event: Spring 2004. I barely managed to scrape out two senior essays.
Impact? I spent about two weeks never sleeping more than 2-4 hours at any given time. I was a mess and had a couple of my friends concerned that I wouldn't graduate. I'm pretty sure that from this week was born my core belief that when I, specifically,  needed to get something done, it would get done. Believing in your own competence is a strong thing.

Event: August 2006. My grandmother has a mini-stroke two weeks after I move out of the apartment.
Impact? Intellectually I know the two events aren't related. But emotionally, I've never been able to separate the slight guilt that I wasn't there and was instead buying soap dishes for my first solo apartment. This might have also been when the very earliest signs of her eventual Alzheimer's started to show up.

Event: Summer/Fall 2008. The end of my first job.
Impact? It wasn't pretty. It was complicated and there were moments when I felt like bits of my soul were being stolen. But I came out the other side with a new appreciation for the things that made me a more complete person. Work would never bring me 100% satisfaction, and I need to equal more than my job at the end of the day.
Funny Side Note: I took fun-employment very seriously, and managed to travel to Belize, Spain, Mexico, Jamaica, the Bahamas, the Dominican Republic and Aruba during my time off.
More Important Side Note: I also had time to really address the changes that were occurring with my grandmother's mentally as the Alzheimer's started to really make its presence known.


Well there's a snippet of some of my significant moments that have changed me. Can you think of yours?