Sixteen years ago, this week, I found an obituary with my name on it. Here’s what I’ve been up to since I died in 1999.

I lived in Indiana.

I started smoking.

I bought my first car.

I got lost in a cornfield in Iowa while trying to find the gas station the sign on the interstate promised me was out there somewhere.

I lived in Kansas.

I voted in my first presidential election.

I was cast in two plays because I was the only person who could speak with an authentic southern accent.

I lived in Michigan.

I met wonderful people.

I met less-than-wonderful people.

I went back to college.

I ate cake at my wedding.

I flew on an airplane for the first time.

I read all of the Harry Potter books.

I quit smoking.

I went to the top of the Space Needle.

I built a house with my husband. Well, I watched people build it.

I gave birth. Twice.

I found out I’m mysteriously talented in accounting, even though I hate math, and people will pay you to be good at accounting.

I saw Mount Rushmore.

I watched the Evolution of Dance video.

I lived in Washington.

I fulfilled my childhood dream of seeing the Redwoods.

I got lost in a pitch black lava tube cave because my sister doesn’t double-check her flashlight batteries.

I drank wine on a yacht that was sailing around Vancouver harbor. (I also spilled some of the wine while telling a story because I talk with my hands a lot.)

I learned how to hard boil eggs.

I visited Mount St. Helens.

I binge-watched the new Doctor Who.

I read Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone to my daughters.

I got into stupid arguments.

I got into valid and important arguments.

I learned how to make coffee (depending on who you ask).

I wrote a book.

I ate junk food and watched TV and went to the movies and sat through meetings and shopped for presents and yelled at the computer and filed my taxes and bought socks and left crumbs on the counter and decided not to drink milk on its expiration date and laughed at jokes and helped with homework and fell asleep on the couch and broke my iPod and forgot to set the alarm clock.

I lived.