I once was a writer...

When I was 16, I had a boyfriend. One of my mom's friends, very close to the family and for whom I cared very much, once asked me (in front of my mom) if said boyfriend made me laugh. In trying to be bold and mature and, well, in trying to surprise and scare my mom, I said, "Well, yeah, kinda. But most importantly, he is awesome in bed!" I was lying, in case anyone is freaking out. My mom was (and probably is again now) freaking out. Her friend simply said, "Whatever, that is not important. What is important is that he makes you laugh. That is the most important thing: to be with someone who makes you laugh." This is perhaps the best piece of advice I have ever been given. Be with someone who makes you laugh . Because, the thing is, this not only refers to sex partners. This is true for life, and for everyone in your life. In my life. In counting my friends, I realize we laugh a lot together. Bear in mind that most my friends are English majors, like me; so ou...

I realize I'm not married yet, and that I am asking for advice well in advance of my real needs. However, last week we experienced a situation that neither of us (my fiancé and I) knew how to handle. Since I do not want to get into the personal details of our lives (I promised Honey I would never do that), I will present the situation as an analogy... We happened to find ourselves, one day, without toothpaste at home. After all the normal bickering (Honey: How can you NOT notice that we are running out of toothpaste? You know all you have to do is ask for money and I will give it to you so that you can go buy toothpaste!  Me: How do YOU not notice? You brush your teeth daily, just as much as I do, and since you have the money YOU could have gone and bought it... ), we decided to go together to buy the toothpaste. We quickly kissed and made up because it is stupid to quarrel over toothpaste, and it was neither of our faults. I mean, nobody wants to wake up on a Monday morning and ...

As I was lying in bed earlier today, devouring my third easter chocolate bar, I said to Honey, "If it doesn't rain, I will ride my bike to class tomorrow." Honey made a face, and I --my mouth filled with chocolate, teeth brown and all-- said to him, "I need to have some kind of movement, Honey, some kind of exercise. I feel like a cow!" He stopped what he was doing. I believe the world stopped spinning for a split second. As he was about to make some mean, evil comment about the fact that I am, in fact , a cow, I yelled at him to stop - to shut up. In the midst of my screaming I even spit a little chocolate onto his back. "Don't you dare say a word," I shrieked, "don't you dare agree with me that I am a cow. Choose your words wisely, Honey, because the wedding can still be cancelled." He looked at me with the loveliest puppy-dog eyes, the ones he uses when he knows he messed up. He looked at me with those eyes and said, "I ...

What's in a name? A rose by any other name would smell as sweet - right? But then, when remembering who you are, you need to know where you come from, or so said Mufasa. And both of those require your name. So your name is you . And changing your name changes you. Right? If a rose were called "violet" it would not be a rose. Yes? I don't know. I'm not even sure what side I'm arguing for. Or against. All I know is that right now I am faced with making the decision of what the heck to do with my name. My name is really long (last name, that is), because in Colombian culture people use both their father's as well as their mother's last name. It used to be that when women married, their name would be legally changed: They would lose their mother's name, keep their father's, and become "of" the husband. For example: my aunt was born Graciela Murillo Salazar. But when she married (a half a century ago) she legally became Graciela M...

I hate marketing. I hate it. I hate it -- because it works. You see, I'm getting married in seven months (yay me! Check out our wedding website ), and I need to do all the planning here in Germany for a wedding taking place in the Caribbean coast of Colombia. It does seem like a challenge, but I am an amazing planner and I can do it. Also, my mom and sister/Maid of Honor have it all under control. But, as I said, since I'm in Germany, there are many things I need to do online. So I have to rely on websites to kinda figure out what I want. Before I went online, I took advice from my good friend Hope (who also recently married) and closed my eyes and imagined my perfect wedding. This is what my perfect wedding looks like: At the beach, hopefully getting our feet wet while saying "I do", at sunset, with only our closest family and friends (so, no more than 20 people), drinking piña coladas and eating fish and coconut rice, listening to soothing background music a...

I couldn't sleep a couple of nights ago. I must have eaten too much. But that happens more often than not. I try to finally "go to bed" (as in, go to sleep) when I can no longer keep my eyes open. But that takes a while. I have been known to surf all the things  on imgur on my iPhone until the battery runs out, which really bothers Honey. He says that we should sleep together, at the same time. I try not to think, I try to free my mind. But that doesn't always work. And, like I said, I really couldn't sleep the other night. I "went to bed" at 10 pm, but I was really, really tired. I could hardly keep my eyes open, I could not focus on anything, I could not stop yawning. So I figured it was about time. Of course, as my friend Murphy would have it, it was only when I turned off all the lights, hit the mute switch on all the phones, turned off the TV and the laptop, found the perfect pillow position and sighed what I expected to be the last sigh of the ...

Honey hates birthdays. At least so he claims. Last year, I "forced" him to have an awesome birthday party - and he had a blast! We all did. We all had loads of fun. We began at 8 p.m., and 6 a.m. we were still singing. Actually the singing began only at 4 a.m., but that is beyond the point. The point is we had fun. And the best part was (for Honey, at least, who was paying the bill) we payed a little over 100 Euros for more than 30 guests in a private room at an awesome bar. So, seriously - wow. But this year Honey really didn't want to to do anything. He said that he did not feel like inviting both friends and acquaintances to drink at his expense, but that he did not know how to not invite the acquaintances; he said it was too complicated, and too expensive, and that he didn't have any ideas for a venue, and and and, but but but. After trying to convince him for a couple of days (that was waaaay back in early November), I came to a realization: You know, I told m...