27 things I now know at 27…happy birthday to me!!!

Today is my birthday. I have been alive for 27 years. This means my knowledge of the world should be enough to fill archives on archives of storage files (it does not). I shan’t go on a defeatist rampage about how I had planned my 27th birthday at the start of the year (read: long weekend away at an expensive lodge in Mpumalanga, getting drunk on unnecessarily sweet pina coladas and orange juice-sparse mimosas, new photographs added to the cloud). We have enough no-can-do news and posts these days.
I have instead decided to collate all that I know about life. Yes, this IS an exhaustive list 🙂

1. Don’t forget to wash your neck, and your ass. They’re not self-cleaning organs/tissues.
2. It’s strange to be this age. I’m old enough to say I hooked up with someone 7 years my junior and it is LEGAL.
3. Your heart and vagina are gold. Be intentional with who and what you let into them.
4. Failing is part of life. It is not your entire life.
5. “You have to participate relentlessly in the manifestations of your blessings.” Quote from ‘Eat, Pray, Love’
6. It is not your responsibility to teach, debate or argue with men about sexism. Do it only if you want to.
7. It is not your responsibility to teach, debate or argue with white people about racism. Do it only if you want to.
8. Everything, EVERYTHING, gets better with age.
9. Self-confidence is conditioned at a young age. Children who are showered with love and adoration become self-assured adults.
10. The world is shitty to girls.
11. Words matter. ‘Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never harm me’ is a load of crap.
12. Words matter. Be an affirmative person.
13. Sweet peppers have more vitamin C than oranges.
14. Slapping a piece of vegetable atop a pizza does not make it healthy. Also, knowing a black man does not make you not racist.
15. No one has their act together all the time. Cut yourself some slack if you got a few misses.
16. Cunnilingus is a trip. More men should get into it.
17. Get into the habit of photographing and taking videos of special people and moments. Memories fade.
18. Apparently, the brain cannot differentiate between milk and dark chocolate. The same reward hormone will be released whether you stuff yourself with a sugar-loaded Bar-One or a bitter 80% cocoa chocolate bar. (I say apparently because I choose to blindly follow this [and not google it] in my quest to sustain my dairy-free dopamine-rich? lifestyle.)
19. Do not make important life decisions when you’re bleeding.
20. Music WILL change your mood. It is that powerful.
21. I don’t HAVE TO be on social media if it disrupts my mental health. It is not a requirement for existing as a millennial.
22. Cheese is dairy. Going dairy-free means having to give up cheese:(
23. Rihanna is the absolute baddest human to have walked the earth in our generation.
24. I don’t have to be the best at anything to take up space and cement myself where I want to.
25. Explore as much of yourself as you can while you’re young. it’s not cute to only figure out at age 26 that you might be into girls.
26. That said, it’s never too late to find and redefine yourself.
27. Believe in your fine ass self, cav yourself, rate yourself heavy.