'Why I Aught-a': a decade in review

While one could argue that every second of one's existence brings change, this decade spelled enormous change in Ms. Fitz's life. The 2000s is the decade where I reached adulthood, discovered who I was and who I wanted to be.

I got an education. Got a job. Got laid. Got drunk. Had my heart broken, my mind expanded and my self brought both low and high. I got a life and learned how to live it. I enjoyed the good, learned from the bad and slogged through the ugly. I explored, experimented and evolved.

Here I am, with both successes and failures, the many-layered, metamorphosed Ms. Fitz. More success than failure, I'd say, though which benefitted me greater only time will tell.

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2000:

Rang in the new millennium with my high school girlfriends at a basement party with a six-pack of coolers and passed out on the couch, safe in a Y2K-free world. By the end of the year, I would no longer be friends with most of these people. Nothing terrible or dramatic--just a big year of transitions and changes.

I looked forward to playing my final year of rugby for the school team. Instead, I tore my ACL in the first game and required knee surgery that ended any small sports inclination that I had.

Turned 18 and enjoyed both my first drunken night out at a dive bar and my first lapdance in the same evening.

Began my birthday May Long camping tradition: a half-dozen friends, a couple of tents and a whole lot of drinking. Drinking would play a large part of the next few years. My liver will thank me later, I'm sure.

I finished high school. Had a fantastic grad afterparty at Bettsy's, from what I can (fuzzily) remember. Loved my grad gown. Still wish I fit it. Don't think I still even own it.

Spent my last summer at the family cottage with my grandparents, who celebrated their 50th anniversary. Was the last time I would have my whole family together for a huge, festive occasion. Wouldn't see them again for three years. Wouldn't see my grandpa again, as he passed away the next year.

In September, started my first year of university at the U of A. At this point, knew I was going to be an Arts student, but still had it in my head that I was going to major in Anthropology. University was a place where I felt I belonged for the first time in my life. Lightyears beyond high school. Surrounded by people with whom I could share and discuss ideas. Participating in intelligent conversations in the day, and getting blind drunk on pubcrawls in the night, while still managing to pull off nearly straight A's in every class.

My social butterfly spread its wings; I couldn't get enough of meeting new people in class, in extra-curricular activities and at the PowerPlant (RIP).

My first-ever class was an English course on the study of the British novel. That class and the professor who taught it would change the course of my future studies, building upon my love of reading and creating the writer who lives today.

While most people got chubbier eating and drinking through the university lifestyle, I got super-skinny. Thought I'd hit the metabolism jackpot. Would learn later that in fact I had gallstones and a gall bladder infection that would lead to serious pain and surgery later on. But at the time, I just dug fitting all the small and kid-sized clothes I could. Belly shirts. With oversized yellow modrobes pants (shit, remember those?) and candy-kid bracelets. Died my hair black-red then black-blue, and had the energy to put contacts in every morning, so I never wore glasses. (Today I hardly take them off.)

Ended the year with friends and fireworks, and a tinsel-y headband in my hair. Remember dancing in my kitchen with Steph P., Erin, Corine, Heather and Kelly to Moby's 'Play' Album. Snuggled together in my basement, watching movies and made brunch on New Year's Day.