February 14th.  It begins in the classroom. You work all night cutting hearts out of paper doilies and dumping red glitter onto a shoebox.  You quickly pass out the Charlie Brown Valentine’s Cards you spent an hour individually taping Dum-Dums to.  You head back to your desk, anxiously awaiting to see how many cards are in your box.  You begin to count.. 3, 11, 19… …

“I came to Burn because I wasn’t accountable on my own; I just wanted to go to a class and have a professional tell me what to do. On my own I would be motivated to work out for two weeks, and then be totally lazy for a month- completely inconsistent. Before I came to Burn, I played roller derby and had recently suffered an …

I am morbidly afraid of snakes.  I often have nightmares of them sneaking up into my bed, only to find myself awoken in a cold sweat, frantically throwing my covers off and searching under the pillows.  Their scaly, quick, coiling, slithering bodies (even typing the description is giving me chills).   It has even gone as far that if all of my best friends were planning …

Every time I am at a party, without a doubt, I try to encourage/force people against their will to play a little game I like to call, ‘I Love, I Hate’.   Although I originally created it as a drinking game back in my college days, the rules are simple enough to play with anyone, on any occasion. RULES OF THE GAME: Everyone sits in …

I tend to follow life’s ‘Rules of Thumb’ a little unconventionally.  I wear white after Labor Day, I sometimes burp at the dinner table, and I do not always do my cleaning in the spring. May I dare say I enjoy cleaning…. Now when I say I enjoy cleaning, please don’t picture me in a frilly white apron, wearing red high heels, with a plastered …

I got laid-off last week. I was at my job for four years, loved what I did and loved the people I worked with. It was a rough, unexpected lay-off. Cold, brutal, and dramatic. I felt like someone cut my umbilical cord, only this time at the age of 28.  (I think the sky even burst into flames, but it’s hard to say for sure). …

October is National Anti-Bullying Month. In a society so beyond obsessed with appearance, weight is often a hot topic of conversation. However, this particular type of bullying is often times forgotten or not seen as important of an issue as race, gender, or sexuality.  But the effects are the same as any other; leaving an individual feeling down or ashamed, leading to low self-esteem, poor …

I happen to think I am a champion of change. I am the type of person who gets tired of my dresser being in the same corner, so I rearrange my bedroom every couple of weeks.  I was the first to ‘like’  Timeline on Facebook and embraced Drew Carey in replacement of Bob Barker.  So why is it that I have been meaning to give …

As I’m sitting here pounding away at the keyboard, taking a Power Chai Latte (extra shot of espresso) to the face, I’m posed with the question, ‘How much is too much?’ Sure, we all have that certain ‘friend’ or particular song that you can only handle in small doses.  But eating leftover Chinese food for breakfast lunch and dinner or ordering that extra drink at …

My eighteen year old ‘honorary sister from another mister’, is beginning college in the fall.  When I asked her what she feared the most about embarking on a new change in life, she confided that -besides Math classes- she was nervous about all the assigned reading material. This completely, and equally, floored as to confused me.  I thought she was being sarcastic. This is coming …