Dreams and do overs

Dreams are a funny thing, aren't they? Well, I remembered mine from last night, which doesn't happen too often, so I'm going to write it down before I forget. Oh, and Cyn, it was about YOU.
Hahaha, don't be alarmed. It was brief and nothing too odd. In my dream, we lived very close to each other in LA. Anyway, we talked on the phone about as much as we do now and we never saw each other. It was time for me to move back and we realized that we should have made a better effort to see each other and appreciated the fact that we lived close by. Then I woke up. See? Nothing embarrassing or crazy :)
I have very few regrets. Things that aren't necessarily earth changing but would have made an impact in my little world. But this dream reminded me of one thing I would like to do over. wished I had enjoyed university life more. Especially now that I have responsibilities! I wished I had taken advantage of living away from home and asked my roommates/friends to go on road trips. I met some incredible people in college but we were either too lazy or complacent to think to leave the campus. And if you knew what parking was like in San Francisco, you would know that we had a point not wanting to leave our sweet parking spots. Sounds stupid but it was such a pain in the ass arriving for class 45 minutes later and STILL being late for class because I couldn't find parking. But I also know that we could have taken public transportation. I think it would have been so fun to go on a trip with Cyn and Kim or a few of my sorority sisters. Or just done day explorations because we had the perfect schedules to do those kind of things! Now we have work schedules, errands and responsibilities.
I wish I had been a nicer child to my parents. I was a typical baby of the family so I was a little bit spoiled and a little bit bratty. They were pretty strict with me so I retaliated with lack of appreciation and lots of attitude. Since my teen years, I've learned to appreciate how truly wonderful they are and to be eternally grateful for their unconditional love, I say "I love you" whenever I see them and will probably be making up for punk ass attitude for the rest of my life. If I could do it over, I wouldn't have been embarrassed to go out with them, have shut them out, and would have asked to go on more family trips. I would have also been smarter and insisted to join a sports team when I was a freshman and pushed to have a job during high school (my parents thought both would distract me from school work) so I would have been out of the house more and we wouldn't have driven each other so crazy!
Another thing I would do over is how I treated my childhood pup, Chewy. This is actually a difficult confession because I still feel really, really feel bad. Chewy was a sweet dog that was neglected. He was an outdoor dog that hardly went inside because he wasn't potty trained. He certainly didn't have the comfort of sleeping with us upstairs. He was so sweet but wild because we didn't train him. Anyway, he led a depressing life. I got him when I was in 5th grade and was a decent owner up until the end of high school. Then he was hardly walked and stayed outside, no matter if it was raining or very hot. When I went to college, he hardly received any attention. He was fed, given water and that was it. While my parents liked Chewy, too, they didn't know how to deal with an untrained dog (which, ironically, was the result of our decisions.)
Yes, I'm a pet lover. And a dog may be just a dog to other people. But it makes me cry to think of how much he suffered outside, how lonely he must have been because he had a selfish teenager (then college student) as an owner. Dogs have so much love to give and they are entirely dependent on their owners for their quality of life. Oh lawdee, I must sound like Oprah. For a long time, I didn't want another dog after Chewy passed away. I knew that I was a crappy owner who wouldn't or couldn't devote the time a dog needed. Even my sister would remind me how much time a dog required whenever I entertained the idea about getting a new one.
Years later, I started to dating Jon and he wanted me to get a dog. I told him, "No! I'm not over the loss of my dog yet." Chewy passed away in 1999. I told you I have a lot of guilt. But The Man really wanted a Doberman and thought it would be good for me to have a companion when I'm home alone. But the guilt! He obviously wore me down and four years later, I have TWO pups. And obviously I had a say regarding the breed. What a difference maturity and help make in raising pups - it's like night and day! I'm a much better owner but I still regret how neglected my childhood pet was and wish I could do it all over. I loved him but, honestly, my parents and I had no business having a dog.
But I have plenty of "no regrets" too. To just go over a few, I don't regret my long term relationship with the boyfriend before The Man. Oh, you bet I wish I could have a do over of how we ended so I could have really socked it to him! But I don't regret that relationship because I think I learned a lot and that being in a relationship all throughout college kept me out of trouble. I know that I'm a better girlfriend from that experience. I don't regret attending a State university rather than a U.C. I admit I'm envious of those with degrees from UCLA and UC Berkeley, though, but I met so many fascinating people at SFSU and learned so much from my professors. I loooooved my university in case you couldn't tell :) I definitely, DEFINITELY, don't regret briefly leaving non-profit because that experience made me realize that I am meant to be in non-profit (but I do regret the I-hate-my-job weight that I gained!)
There's plenty more I could write about but these are just the things off the top of my head. I would ask what you would do over or what you do not regret but it's up to you to share.