What's happened has happened/ What's coming is already on its way*

The last time I was single for any significant amount of time was 6th grade. Significant being a period of time lasting longer than 3 weeks. The very last day of 6th grade, as I was getting ready to board the bus and make my way home, I was asked out by Ernest, my first boyfriend, and that was the end of my single life. I was 11. I'm now 22. Take a moment to let that marinate in your brain because that's all I've been thinking about for a little over a day now. Yea. It's nutty. I thought maybe I was exaggerating things the way I'm sometimes prone to do, but nope every school year from then on was marked by some boy or another. I thought maybe 8th grade was the year I was single until I realized that nope it was just the only year I didn't have a serious boyfriend (serious meaning 6 months or more of dating) and instead had 3 (or maybe 4- my memory is a little fuzzy) different boyfriends.

Yea, right about now I'm wondering why I'm sharing this with you. I don't know really, I think I'm just trying to make sense of it all. Its not like I regret any of those boyfriends, even the bad ones were good for learning something vital about life. Like don't trust assholes or pretty boys are sometimes bad kissers. Plus the mere fact that I can remember who I was dating in 8th grade and not what I learned that year in school must mean something. It could just mean that I was a big ol' slut in 8th grade, but I doubt that's true. Mostly because I knew some slutty 8th graders and I wasn't one of them.

My point though is that I feel like I should feel bad or wrong that I'm 22 and I've been dating for 11 years. But I don't. Its the lack of feeling bad about it that makes me feel weird about the whole thing. Did you follow? If we were talking about anyone else I'd think that continuously dating for 11yrs would do bad things to your psyche. But we're talking about me, and I was me at 11 and I think all that dating was good for me. Dating was what made me human. Its what made me stop being so mean to people. What taught me to accept people just as they are. To stop kicking people. To just chill out and enjoy the process of living. To feel responsibility for making other people cry. All that dating didn't make me boy crazy, or make my identity revolve around men, it did just the opposite. That being said though, I'm looking forward to being single. To plunging into the great unknown all by myself. Its terrifying. But its time.

Some links:

* Ok. First off, I wouldn't open this link around people. Secondly you have to know that I found this link here, and I share it with you only because it confuses me greatly, and I like to share confusion. I'm not sure what's going on in this picture, or where it came from, or why grown men would willingly pose in penis outfits. I just know its funny and disconcerning all at the same time.

* If you ever wanted to track all the cabs in LA now you can.

* Read this. Read the entire thing, especially the end. And then read this.

* Researchers at Tufts found out something pretty amusing, white people act better when in diverse situations. via kottle

* I don't own an ipod, but you might so here are 50 fun things to do with your ipod.

* And if you're still bored there's always popurls

* Oh and the title comes from Fiona Apple's "Red, red, red", in case you were wondering.