So, we're finally making our way through the 4,935,687 things that we TiVo'ed this week (most of them reality shows, duh, and also reruns of "Scrubs," which will never not be funny, because Zach Braff is teh r0xx0rz). One of our regularly scheduled programs is NUMB3RS, and this week one of the guest stars (she plays the pervo teacher) looked familiar, so I looked her up on IMDB. And lo and behold, what to my wondering eyes should appear, but that another guest star this week is someone I think I went to high school with: Georgia Hatzis. I'm still not 100% sure it's her, but I'm 99.997% sure, which is close enough for horseshoes and hand grenades.

To confirm this, I did what I believe is maybe the stupidest thing I ever did this weekend, which is pull out my high school yearbook and look her up. I also Googled her (because I am a creepy weirdo stalker, obviously), but none of the images I was able to find were as convincing as Ye Olde Yearbooke Photographe. And of course this all led to my eleventy squillionth Malibu Barbie Nervous Breakdown this week, because yearbooks = high school = memories = UN.Comfortable!

I ... don't know what's happened to me since high school. Not that I was any great shakes then, either, but at least when I was 18, I thought I would eventually outgrow the Ugly Dorkling stage and turn into Someone So Much Way More Cooler Than I Was Then. Which is so not hard to do, because -- have I mentioned I was a total Ugly Dorkling? I still refer to that period of my life as my reign as Queen of the Nerds. And yet, here I am, 14 years later, still a dork, still decidedly uncool, and still blahblahbittercakes about it.

Because, here's the thing: everybody thinks they're going to grow up to be rich and famous and super and awesome when they're Older. And I'm not yet, I don't think I'm even barely on my way, and at the rate I'm going, I'm never going to be, either. I mean, there's always the lotto, but even then? A lot of my retirement plans are based on the Magical Accounting Principle of "scratch and win." And even though $205 million is a lot of money, I could totally spend that on Kate Spade bags alone. (Real ones, even, not just the knockoffs.)

Anyway ... this isn't how I figured my life would be when I was 32, you know? I wanted to have a Pulitzer Prize for the daring exposé I did on the cruel and unusual training regimens of world-championship-level gymnasts. (Big old no-go there, because the smell of chalk and sweat and perky 72-lb., 17-year-old rag dolls makes me want to hurl.) I thought I'd have an Emmy for my Outstanding Perfomance in the Field of Monday Night Football Play-by-Play Announcing, plus my own official yellow Howard Cosell-era blazer. (Although in retrospect, I'd probably have been partnered with someone stupid for MNF anyway, like Troy Aikman or Michael Irvin, and not somebody cool and gorgeous like Mark "Stink" Schlereth, so I'd also probably end being called a diva or something, because DALLAS SUCKS!, and I'd need to mention that once or a hundred times per telecast.)

What do I have instead? A critical crisis of confidence. I don't even think this blog entry is very good, but I've been working on it for an hour, so I'm going to post it and you're going to read it, dammit. It's hard for me to accept that, when he was my age, Ben Affleck had an Oscar. Ben Fucking Affleck! Eminem has an Oscar, too. When am I going to get my Oscar? When I am going to live up to my potential and become the awesome, wonderful, talented person I always thought I could be? Why is my life -- my perfect little life, with the husband and the Volkswagen and the cats and the 6,300 songs on my iPod -- why is this not enough for me?

And seriously: who in their right mind thought Tony Kornheiser was a good choice for MNF? That guy is an idiot. God.

Dear Future Gonzales Child,

I was thinking about you today. Not wondering, or worrying, but just thinking. I don't know anything about you yet -- we haven't met. You may be a boy or a girl, brown-eyed or blue-eyed, blonde or brunette. You could have already had a birthday or two, or you could still be growing inside someone else's belly. Your skin might be the color of chocolate, or milk, or mocha ice cream. I think about you often, even though we don't know each other yet. And even though I don't know who you are, or what you are, or where you are -- I know that I already love you.

The words I have for you are someone else's, but they say what I am thinking better than anything I could come up with own my own, so ... I just wanted you to know that:

Somewhere out there, beneath the pale moonlight
Someone's thinking of you, and loving you tonight
Somewhere out there, someone's saying a prayer
That we'll find one another in that big somewhere out there
And even though I know how very far apart we are
It helps to think we might be wishing on the same bright star
And when the night wind starts to sing a lonesome lullaby
It helps to think we're sleeping underneath the same big sky

Copyright information

When you're ready to find us, we're waiting for you. Our door and our home and our hearts are always open. We'll leave the light on for you.

Hope to see you soon,
Mom.