Thursday Thoughts: Contemplations While Eating Pudding

Today is one of those days where nothing seemed to go right. As a person with self proclaimed bad luck, one of the reasons I apply Murphy's Law so much is because if something can go wrong, it will go wrong. Today, unfortunately was one of those days. I was falling asleep in class, dripped syrup all over my new jacket (yeah yeah that new one I raved about got covered like a pancake), and had every college student's worst nightmare come true and lost my ID. This caused me to conclude the day eating pudding because by the time I found my ID, the caf was basically closed (which is something that I don't understand about college students- in my house eating at 8 is the norm, while at school the Caf is basically a ghost town after 7:45.

Last night, despite having a grueling practice and having to get up early to finish work, I could not fall asleep and if you know me, you know this is a rare occurrence. Usually it takes 30 seconds for me to hit the pillow and be out cold. However, I was up sort of pondering life and this is what I came up with.

How I wish I looked when I think about life-
iamahalfbloodwitch.blogpot.com 

I am very happy at school. Bucknell could not have been a better choice for the workload, academics, sports and people. However, the culture here requires somewhat of an explanation to an outsider. There is a lot of pressure to keep up the culture; to dress a certain way, look a certain way, be a certain way and have certain things. I'm not going to sugarcoat the fact that I also succumb to the culture myself. It really doesn't help my wallet that the norm is to carry your books in bags you can only get from Bloomingdales. Let's change it to those free ones from Trader Joe's.
The question is, where do we draw the line? We are always taught "looks shouldn't matter" and "it's what's on the inside that counts," however if you've ever had you mom yell at you for not wearing a dress to a certain event you know that is far from the truth. In the grand scheme of life, are we really going to look back at pictures from college and think "damn, I can't believe I actually wore leggings that weren't Lululemon." Let's be honest, we're going to be cringing at the thought that we ever thought be actually could wear leggings as pants.

I think the key is a balance. There is nothing wrong with wanting to look a certain way. In many ways, it expresses our creativity and personalities. However, maybe we cross the line when we choose our image to be the only thing that defines us, because in reality we really are all onions (Shrek reference anyone?) and have these multiple layers to us that make us truly unique. As long as we see the "bigger picture" and aren't defined by the things we posses. but rather the whole characters we are.
P.S. Creds to Maddie for her superb editing skills! Even at UVA 300 miles away, you never fail to pick out my grammatical mistakes. Also a mashup for your Friday.