Gooooooooooooals I Achieved!

• Studied catechism one-on-one with Father McCown, SJ, the priest who befriended Flannery O’Connor and taught me about grace (1983)
• No longer a Republican (1983)
• Subject of a Playboy article, book and bad movie (1985 – 1988)
• Live in Europe (1985 – 1995)
• A mother (1986)
• Speak a foreign language (1986)
• Youngest President of the American Women’s Club of Antwerp (1992)
• Spearhead the most successful fundraiser for AIDS in Belgium (1994)
• A published writer (1995)
• Have the kind of romances movies are made of (4 times, but not telling….)
• Transformed by a Mughal art exhibition at LACMA (1999)
• Bono, my daughter’s hero, buys her flowers, talks to her about 3rd world debt & prayer, and compliments her braces “teeth jewelery”  (1999)
• On the set of a Wim Wenders movie and met Bud Cort* (1999)
• First cross-country road trip (2002)
• Learned about life via foster parenting thanks to the resilience and forgiveness of Kirsten & Sierra (2003-2004)
• Graduate cum laude from university, though missed Phi Beta Kappa by .000057 (2006)
• Live in UK in fulfillment of a teenage dream (2006 – 2007)
• Travel solo to Africa and India (2008)
• Graduate with a Master’s (2008)
• Executive Platinum on American Airlines three years running (2007, 2008, 2009) though owe carbon offsets big-time
• Run a café (2010)
• Know what love is (2006 – infinity)
• Made peace with my zany parents (a process)
• Happy (almost always)

* This was special because when I was eight, I met my father for the first time and he gave me a man’s necktie, bought me a bunny, and took me to see Harold & Maude