Totally There: My thoughts and hobbies

       A sociological concept poignantly prevalent in today's culture, the 'third place' is the setting where adults can spend time outside of work and home. What are some of the most common, reliable 'third places' in our contemporary world? This varies person-by-person, as the human experience of enjoyment is quite diverse based on your life experiences and preferences.     One of my dearest friends and I participate in a weekly classical mat Pilates course at a local studio together as our shared 'third place'. We recently fortified our exercise ritual with running a few times a week. For both of us, this shared experience of challenging our physical abilities is a reliable method to continue our friendship through the tumultuous years of early adulthood, without constantly having to plan a one-off meeting. As children, her and I were members of the same Girl Scouts troop. We saw each other at least 6 times a week, between weekly scout meetings and passi...

     Have you ever had your optimism quashed by the "glass-half-empty" counterpart? We both know it can hurt. Honestly, the worst part is that the person almost always has positive intention behind their words. The delivery of the message is the faulty component. For the sake of this argument, we will consider only the well-intentioned person, as the purposefully cynical opposer requires a different approach.     One of the hardest conversations to handle constructively is the "Oh, you just wait until..." rhetoric. Wait until you are married, then you will see! Besides relationships, you can here the same argument in relation to a job, school, children, and more. For me, these can steer me down the long, arduous path of dread about what the rest of my life looks like. Why does my conversational partner want to damper my excitement and optimism with a seemingly brutal retort? One thing I have learned for certain is that this dynamic does not represent a person tr...