So, that summer when I...

Just now I took a step back to look at myself -- currently, pacing the downstairs singing in Italian and wishing the air conditioning would hurry up and do its job -- and thought, wow, what a good summer this has been! Or rather, spring and summer.

Despite being pretty much done and over with school for quite a while, I still use seasons -- often summers -- to gauge different stages of my life. You know, there was that summer where I lived alone just to prove I could do it. Or the one where I worked 60 hour weeks to try to forget how miserable and devastated I was over a breakup. Or the one where I moved to Maryland and tried to convince myself I enjoyed living in a lonely apartment in a town I didn't like.

Winter seems to be a time for settling in, for bonding with good friends over homemade soup and cuddling under blankets to watch a movie. Summer inherently requires me to get out more, to leave the house.

This summer represents an unprecedented level of that getting out, exploring, and reaching out, and I can trace it back to the reason I'm pacing the downstairs singing in Italian. At the beginning of the summer I signed up for a group voice class, as much to practice singing in the presence of others as to shake the rust off my vocal cords. I've learned to see our classroom as a safe space where I can sing in the same way I might do alone. On the first day I had to stand up and sing a song a cappella for the group, which broke my stage fright more by force than by desire. I feel like this six-week class provides a pivotal point around which the rest of the summer's events revolve.

For example, I've invited friends to the beach, made a pact of sorts to adopt a positive attitude/demeanor, reached out to make plans for spending time with people I like, gotten a real job, and so on. Overall, I feel like I've spent the spring and summer so far challenging myself to do things that scare me but also bring me a healthy dose of joy when it's all said and done. And maybe, just maybe, if I keep tip-toeing my way outside my comfort zone, I'll take a step back and say wow, my life right now is downright enviable.

How's that for a positive demeanor, free of angst and irritability?