Hoo boy.

So, Hubski, who are you going to be next? Who do you want or plan to be in the future? Who would you wish you were if you could start over, start again, start from the beginning? A different profession or a different persona? Would you be a dude or a lady, maybe both or neither? A tree? Would you raise 5 more kids, 2 less than you do now? Yes, you can be anybody in the next life.

I'd love to become a bartender (or so I think). I'd love a job where I can alter my appearance any way I want, cover myself with tattoos if I want, and no one bats an eye. Right now I want a lip piercing but I know it's not a viable option in this job, in this company, in this industry. That's okay. But I still think I'd rock it.

I've thought about what it would be like if I were a dude. If I were a dude, I'd be a DICK. I really don't think I'd be a nice person if I was dude although if I was a dude from birth I'd be a totally different person so I don't really know, you know? Like maybe all the ways I would take advantage of people if I were a dude are in part due to my frustrations of being a lil lady in a man's world and the giant chip on my shoulder I've had at various times in my life as a result of that. (Chip currently small and adorable. Chip not adorable when it is giant. Smallness of chip a good thing. We must accept who we are in life. And while it is interesting to think about being a dude, I'm not interested in trying to become a dude.) I think I'd be a jerk and I think I'd mostly be a jerk to those of the female persuasion. It's always nice to think you'd be a player in theoreticals, though, right? Who knows? Maybe I would have been a really awkward dude. ANYWAY, it's all fun and games to think about. I find it interesting that you, not-pablo, would be interested in becoming a minority against which there are many and deep-seated prejudices (although you may already be a minority or a double-minority or anything, really)! My choice would be the opposite: GIVE ME ALL THE PRIVILEGE. I RESENT NOT HAVING THE PRIVILEGE. I WANT IT, NOW. (But I like being a lady. Being a lady can be pretty tits in some regard. Go ahead, take it literally.)

Who am I going to be next? Hopefully someone with less debt and who gets a decent score on the GMATs and who can go and get her MBA. Is an MBA my passion? No, but I think it'll be a challenge and it'll increase my marketability. It's a wise/smart choice, in other words. Plus I like school. I like to be challenged. I guess the MBA is my 5-year plan. My boring, Real Life, Real Job, Decisions That Aren't Always Fun But Are Good plan. (My yearly bonus? Going towards debt and savings this year. wooooooooooooooooonotreallywoo at all.)

- Who would you wish you were if you could start over, start again, start from the beginning?

As some of you may have noticed I don't usually spend time thinking about this sort of thing. I view the past as the past, irrevocable and unchangeable. I much prefer to look at who I am now and say "Do I like who I am now? Yes? (On good days, pretty damn much?) Well great. Everything that's ever happened to me, that's made me into who I am, even and especially the shitty stuff. So I wouldn't change a thing." So this is hard for me to answer. I wouldn't unwish any of the difficulty I've had in my life; it would literally make me less of a person. I wouldn't unwish the way my parents raised me, even though it made me weird and left me with some hang-ups and issues. ("They fuck you up, your mom and dad.") I mean, like it'd be great if I was born into a rich family and never had to work a day in my life but then I'd be a brat. I don't want to be a brat.

I wish I had worked in the service industry at some point. I could get a second job and do so but it would seriously impinge upon all the nice perks that my corporate job enables me to have. Which is why I like my corporate job. I think working in the service industry gives you a different and valuable perspective on humanity as a whole. I think it's important.

In the highly-theoretically, "this is my dream" sort of world. I would be getting my MFA in poetry. At a well-regarded institute where I was good enough not to have to pay. (Scholarships.) I'd be a lot more secure in my poetic skill and GOD DAMN IT I'd hear back on my poetry submissions on a fucking TIMELY BASIS. I would be able to get by somehow on poetry and some kind of flexible job like a lot of my peers, even though the pay is shit and there aren't any benefits. I'd be an "artist" emphasis on the "douche" - I mean "tist."

Or I would have followed up on that job on the hydroponics farm in Hawaii. (Who knows if I would have been happy there though? I would have been lonely. It is expensive in Hawaii, too.)

Oh, those, those are just some thoughts. I'd be writing. For my job and it would pay. I wouldn't have to be famous but known, by some people, that would be nice. A book published instead of an on-going "Hey will you illustrate my book for me so I can self-publish? Oh you'll only do it if there's a potential romantic relationship between us? Well damn." (I can't entirely blame this person for that, really. It's not like I was offering to pay him. He liked my poetry book, he was looking for inspiration, I said you know what if you illustrate it I'll put it up on Amazon under both our names and we'll both get some publicity. We stopped seeing each other and I think he was a little mad at me. His response is actually entirely reasonable. But it's one plan that's not going to happen for me, and by damn I liked his art style and thought it was perfect.)

So many of my dreams and desires and futures are nebulous. Is that a bad thing? Am I not driven enough towards goals and futures? Or am I just not attached to them/what happens? I "have world enough, and time." Or that's how it feels.