The Year in Review: 2005
1. What did you do in 2005 that you'd never done before?
I had a recital.
I organized and headed a benefit concert -- made some real change in the world.
I saw my dad looking absolutely helpless.
I made my professional operatic debut.
I saw how much one person touched other people's lives -- and how much it hurt everyone to have him gone.
2. Did you keep your New Years' resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
I don't even remember what they were, so I probably didn't keep them. On the other hand, I bet they're the same every year, so that means I don't keep them, doesn't it?
3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
No.
4. Did anyone close to you die?
Mikey. Mikeymikeymikeymikeymikey.
5. What places did you visit?
Los Angeles, Berlin, the coast of the Baltic Sea in Poland, DC, New York City
6. What would you like to have in 2006 that you lacked in 2005?
Drive to learn more music more quickly. To internalize music, get myself away from the sheet music faster so I can make it my own.
7. What date from 2005 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
The day I got a call from Mark Trawka:
"Our soprano got sick -- can you fill in? Tomorrow?"
"Sure! Of course I know all those songs!" (...)
And then getting paid by Pittsburgh Opera. At 19.
8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Learning to love the music -- the theory, the ensemble -- instead of the sound. Also, learning to embrace and channel different sounds from my one pair of chords. We are not, and should not be, married/chained to one style or sound.
9. What was your biggest failure?
Smoking in Berlin. What the fuck.
10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Nothing out of the ordinary.
11. What was the best thing you bought?
My new laptop/iPod combination?
12. Whose behavior merited celebration?
Everyone in A Chorus Line, who stuck through it and put on a good show dispite all the negative energy from Drama and within.
13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
Marcin's whole outlook on life and love and girls was so depressing that I couldn't actually believe -- and kept hanging out with him because I was certain he'd turn around one day and say "gotcha! of course I don't actually think this way!" But he never did.
14. Where did most of your money go?
On tickets I never used. On useless shit.
15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Surprising myself. Kicking high and getting a pick-up in tap. Getting the soprano role in a 4-person opera. Getting mistaken for a german girl on the U-bahn and being complimented on my Aussprache (accent) by native speakers.
16. What song will always remind you of 2005?
Stuff by Fettes Brot and Silbermond. The song list I made for my early-morning U-bahn rides from Prenzl'berg to Charlottenburg (Marcin's apartment to mine).
17. Compared to this time last year, are you
i. happier or sadder? same. perhaps sadder but wiser.
ii. thinner or fatter? thinner.
iii. richer or poorer? this question still doesn't pertain to me, as I'm not financially independent.
18. What do you wish you'd done more of?
Kayaking in Idaho. That was blim-blam-azing. Beautiful and pictureque, and fun to hang out with my extended family.
19. What do you wish you'd done less of?
Choosing to fool around and/or hang out with people when I knew it was in my best interest to study/work/sleep.
20. How did you spend Christmas?
I'll be spending it with my family in Los Angeles. I think it's going to be pretty low-key; not many cousins are coming since we all met up for Thanksgiving.
21. How will you be spending New Year's?
Dunno. Celebrating my 20th birthday -- the end of adolescence. I'll never be awkward ever, ever again.
22. Did you fall in love in 2005?
Every year, I say I did, and when I look back I think how silly and naive I was to think that. Guess what my answer is this year?
23. How many one-night stands?
OMG KEN FORGIT. I forgot about him. And Russell.
24. What was your favorite TV program?
I got addicted to Sex and the City on On Demand.
25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
I'm not a hater. But I don't like Russell Scharf very much.
26. What was the best book you read?
She's Come Undone and She Comes First, which are two entirely different books.
27. What was your greatest musical discovery?
German pop/rock and R&B. GUSTER entered my life this year.
28. What did you want and get?
Into better shape. I was proud of myself for that, although I'm not proud that I've slacked since A Chorus Line.
29. What did you want and not get?
A steady church gig.
30. What was your favorite film of this year?
Deuce Bigalo: European Gigolo dubbed in German. With a couple of German 13-year-olds on a date behind me making out and laughing at the jokes aimed at europeans.
Seriously though, maybe Allein or Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I'm turning 20. I won't be a teenager any more. I'll be grown up, sort of. But everyone else will go out drinking with me.
32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
A steady singing gig. More time to hang out with people I care about. More performance opportunities -- preferably paying ones, but whatever.
33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2005?
Only One Pair of Pants Fits Anymore. Wear the Same Clothes with New Accessories and Nobody Will Notice.
34. What kept you sane?
Sex and the City. (I know that's sad.) Writing in my paper and online journals.
35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
Oh, whatever. I dunno. Those guys in that New Zealand comedy band, The Flight of the Concords.
36. What political issue stirred you the most?
I did a lot of Katrina relief-related stuff.
37. Who did you miss?
Whomever I wasn't around, I suppose. I didn't do a lot of missing people this year. It was a very independent/lonely year. When I did miss people, I usually felt guilty about it.
38. Who was the best new person you met?
Marcin taught me a lot, but I don't actually like him much. I guess, all the girls in SAI whom I've gotten to know better now.
38.b. Side question...who would you like to get to know better?
Ryan Leonard.
39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2005:
People cannot be changed. They need to be loved for their idiosyncracies.
Not all idiosyncracies are worth forgiving.
Love cannot be forced between two people.
Love is not dead, but there are people who are not willing to welcome it into their hearts.
40. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:
"I'm off on a rocketship prepared for something new / I'm off on a rocketship ecstatic with the view / I am scared for the things upcoming / and I want for the things I don't have / cannot stand to be one of many / I'm not what they are"
Guster - Rocketship