Ashes, Ashes, we all...Write Down?

The five year old version of me would be appalled at my life. It's true. I came into this world with a stick up my ass (ask Pauly or Will or Mom - they will tell you stick in the mud doesn't even fit. More like stick in the motha' flippin' concrete!). I was bossy as hell and I knew everything. Five year old Brandy lived in a world of Black and White. Right and Wrong. I knew everything and then a little more and I expected everyone else to adhere to those standards, too. For instance: I was in second grade and my brother was in first.  Someone started stealing his lunch every morning while he was out playing on the playground. I read a lot of Nancy Drew books at a young age, so I set up a trap to capture the culprit.  Which meant I staked out the "backpack" area while all the other kids were out playing on the jungle gym. I watched this kid dig through and eat several lunches and I brought fruit-roll up evidence that he dumped in the garbage can from my brother's lunch straight to my teacher with a paper towel so we could dust for finger prints and catch this sorry SOB (sure this was the mid 80's and there was no CSI on TV, but I was a sleuth and I knew this evidence would be damning as hell).  I marched right into my teacher before class, evidence in hand and demanded justice! She assured me she would "talk to him".  What?!? Um, hello! Stealing was WRONG!!! I wanted a grade school trial where we busted this criminal and I got to present my case (unbeatable!) before the entire school! The teacher had to call my Mom to get me to back off. Yeah. I know, no one likes an eight year old that thinks they're a supreme court justice.  It never occurred to me that this kid was hungry, that he probably didn't get enough to eat at home, or that he didn't have the "sweet treats" my Mom always packed us. I never thought about his reasons for stealing lunches, only that I knew that stealing was wrong.  Like I said, black and white.  Me today??? I am 340 shades of gray.  I definitely have grown out of my Nancy Drew self.  At eight years old I knew I was going to be a big shot attorney fighting all the injustice in this world (even though my Mom told me she would rather me be something respectable, like a prostitute).  I had a life plan. Graduate at 21 from an Ivy League school, partner by 25, maybe decide to have kids around 28, but have a live at home husband because I was a career woman.  Flash forward.  Somewhere between High School and my long, long college career, I not only took the stick out of my ass, but threw it so far into the Nevada sagebrush that I will never find it again (you're welcome). Like I said before, I live in the gray.  I laugh all the time and I am grateful everyday for that. I am independent to a fault, meaning super single. I went to college for the better half of a decade and finally found my calling as a story teller.  The arts, who'd a thunk??? Ha! Seven days before my 32nd birthday and I am living at home with my recently divorced Mom because starting a business in the arts blossoms only under the the term: FREE RENT!!! That's right, I just started a business with my best friend (more like my sister) and life is funny, stressful, and amazing all at once.  I'm navigating being 30ish (that's what I like to call it), pursing my dream, living back at home, and trying (somewhat) to date in the technological age (dick pics, really?).  I hope what follows is a commentary on those times.  I'm hoping for lots of laughs.  In the words of Jerry Maguire, "Who's with me???"