19 Things I’m Thankful For (On my 19th Birthday!)

**WARNING: This post is truly sappy read at your own risk lol****

FIRST WEEK LET’S GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

It’s my last first week at CCBC! After this semester I plan to transfer to the University of Baltimore so I can wrap up my degree in Business Administration. Send me good thoughts to help me close out this semester, please. Anyways, I missed the blog! I was thinking all summer about what I wanted to write about for you guys, so get excited for my upcoming posts!

To start off the school year… it’s my birthday!! August 31st, 1998. Congratulations to myself for staying alive another 365 days. I don’t know how I did it considering my non-existent sleep schedule and questionable diet, but here I am.

When I thought about what I wanted for my birthday this year, I couldn’t think of much. I am spoiled with countless blessings in my life, that I am certainly not as grateful for as I should be. Every time my birthday comes around I think about that fact and when people go out of their way to still make the day extra special for me, I am overwhelmed. My mom told me recently that if we are grateful for something then we show it by taking care of whatever it is, and that really made me think. So for my 19th, I decided to practice that and put my gratefulness into action! I hope you guys enjoy reading it, and are inspired to do similar things, because this was such a unique and fulfilling birthday experience ( ᐛ )و

19 Things I’m Thankful For (On my 19th Birthday!!)

1. FREEDOM OF RELIGION – I am so thankful I live in a place that allows me to wear my hijab and express my religious identity. The list of things I’m thankful for are ultimately things I am thankful to God for, so today I did extra dhikr (or remembrance) in order to show that.

1. MY PARENTS – A no brainer, of course. If you’re lucky like I am, they raised you from a helpless baby into a fully fledged human, and didn’t expect much in return. I made them a nice breakfast as a tiny and insignificant gesture of thanks.  I would have liked to make something fancier but they both work, so it had to be to-go style.
   

   catch me with the fancy insta pics

    

2. MY CATS – Y’all already knooooooooow I had to mention the Cat Collective. My cats relieve my stress and cheer me up every single day and I would be doing this list an extreme disservice not to include them. To show them how much I care I brushed all of them, gave them treats, and played with them till they got tired. Love my kids. 
   

   Sher Khan (hes really weird)

   

   James (hes a perfect angel)

   

   Puddles (shes really clingy)

    

3. MY CARS – Well, not MY cars per say but boy HOWDY I would not be able to live life without them. Cleaned out our van and gave it a hug so it knew it was appreciated.
4. MY NEIGHBORS – It’s always nice to see a friendly face when you walk outside in the morning, and I’ve heard awful stories of people who aren’t as lucky as I am. Pulled a classic neighbor move for this one and delivered fresh baked brownies. 
5. MY HOUSE – I am high key a superrrr messy person (even though I’m pretty organized, does that make sense?) and I definitely don’t show proper respect for the place where I spend the majority of my life. I tried to change that and made sure to give the kitchen, which I am primarily responsible for making a mess of, a good cleaning. Not sure I can keep this one up but I tried (´ω｀*)
6. CLEAN WATER – A huge HUGE resource that I can’t live without but constantly take for granted. Today I used it as efficiently as possible and sped up my usual routines of washing up, cleaning, etc.
7. MY COWORKERS – I worked at a pediatrician’s office this summer to save up some cash for the semester and I looked forward to the job instead of being bored out of my mind because of the wonderful and extremely capable women I was able to work with. Thank you for cheerfully bearing with me as the bumbling temporary hire, Sana, Usna, and Mariam! This one was a major rush job, I posted silly notes on their workplaces to make them laugh.
   

   YALL DESERVE BETTER THAN THIS CRAP HANDWRITING i’ll make it up to you (T-T)

    

8. MY EDUCATION – I am so grateful to the teachers who shaped me, especially when I was younger. Shout out to a real legend, my 1st grade teacher Mrs. Hogeback who is the best teacher I ever had. She taught me to read, and I really wanted to give someone else that gift. I signed up to be a volunteer tutor with Maryland Reading Partners, my training starts at the end of this semester! I am wayyy excited to help a child learn a lifelong skill like reading, I’ll keep the blog updated with how that goes. 
   

   Official Confirmation

    

9. MY CLOTHES – I take reallyyy bad care of my clothes. I also have the nerve to whine fairly often that I have too many clothes and don’t even get to wear all of them. Yes, I acknowledge how astoundingly #FirstWorld that is. To show that I really am grateful for them, I PROPERLY washed and pressed all my month old laundry, and collected old clothes to give them to someone who could make proper use of them. 
   

   bye bye old clothes!

    

10. MY BROTHERS – As far as brothers go, they could be way, WAY more annoying. As it is they help me out with things ranging from rides to FAFSA to random advice to music recommendations. Honestly all they ever want from me is food so I made milkshakes for them.
11. THE EARTH – Please don’t be mean to Mother Earth, she’s just trying her best to be beautiful and healthy. Any time I saw trash today, I went out of my way to dispose of it properly. 
    

    *to the tune of stevie wonder* isnt she loooooovely

12. YOUTUBE – *gasp* No YouTube? How would I know how to make microwave cake? Where would I watch relatable KPOP reaction videos? Like most of us, I’m a pretty silent viewer but today I liked, subscribed, and commented on my favorite videos that I know people worked hard to create.
13. MY BODY – I have ears, eyes, a nose, a tongue, hands, feet, hair, and all sorts of other parts of my body that work pretty great. Isn’t that awesome? I stretched really well and started the day with a good breakfast. Your body will definitely respond in kind if you show your thankfulness by treating it right! 
    

    U know i never used to like oatmeal… guess I’m old now.

     

14. MY BOSS – As a student ambassador, I work under one very lovely Mrs. Lesley Lowe. She’s my boss, and she’s also one of the friendliest, organized, understanding, and all around awesome people I know. She’s always downplaying the work she does but I wanted her to know that I really truly appreciate being able to work under someone like her, and I’ve always had a fantastic experience as an ambassador with her leadership . I also know she reads all our student bloggers posts whenever she can so HI MS. LESLEY!! I’M SUPER THANKFUL FOR YOU!!
15. MY FRIENDS – Mannnnnnnnn. I could write an entire trilogy on how awesome my friends are. How beautiful and kind and strong and smart and funny and wonderful they are. For now, since I can’t see them IRL, I sent them all messages to remind that I love them very very much.
16. KINDNESS OF STRANGERS – Everyone has a moment of when a stranger said or did something that made their whole day. I wanted to be that stranger, so today I gave as many genuine compliments to as many people as I could. Seeing them all smile was awesome!
17. MY IMPERFECTIONS – The things I do not like about myself are just as responsible for shaping me as the things which I do like. Today I took a good look in the mirror and thought about the lessons I’ve gained from all my imperfections.
18. MY PROFESSORS – Often I leave a great class feeling like a changed person at the end of semester, but what do I give the teacher? Not much, usually. I gave some of my old and coolest professors A+ ratings and summaries on RateMyProfessor so they (and others) would see they were being appreciated. 

TA DAAAAA there it is!! Not gonna lie it was a little bit stressful to get all 19 of these done in 1-2 days but was it worth it? Most definitely. I hope everyone had a great first week, I’ll post again soon!

– Sumra ╭(♡･ㅂ･)و ̑̑