Turmoil/Upheaval/Whatever

Today is September 30th. Today is fiscal year end. Today is my first day without my boss. Cause she quit. Mega, mega yikes.

Two weeks ago my boss had finally had it "up to here" and turned in her two weeks resignAsh. (That's the phonetic spelling of the abbreviation of resignation. Done.) It's our busiest time of year, mind you. Okay, December/January is kinda crazy, too, but this is big time! So why am I blogging instead of working my fingers to the bone? Um...good question.

But know this - it's a tumultuous though exciting time in Arlington/Washington. My boss quit so now things will be very interesting around here, especially for her underlings, Marlene and me. My landlady told us that she has an offer on the house and it waiting to see if all works out for her to sell it. Cut to me doing the Joey Lawrence "WHOA!" from the unforgettable TV series Blossom. Anyway, now all the roommates are in a bit of a tizzy as we await word on whether or not we will live in our house for the next 10 months. For you legal zonks out there, you should know that we met with the landladylord and told her we'd be willing to terminate the lease early for adequate compensation, none of which is yo bidnez. I mean--none of which I will detail here. This is the third time in as many years that she's tried to sell, so we're all over it and want to move on to someplace else where we can live in peace. Blah blah blah. So I've been looking at rental houses for the past week and a half. Going to see one today after work, actually. Of course, who knows if I'll even move. I'll keep you updated.

Here are other random things I've been up to lately: went to Nashville for a weekend, went to Tulsa for a weekend ("Ryan & Ryan: Mirrored Pianos" was a smash hit), started attending a women's small group at my church, going to an art showing tonight, NOT going to the gym. Woops. You know how it takes forever to get into the habit of going to the gym and then like two seconds to get out of the habit? I've about hit the two second mark. Gotta remedy that tonight.

No more blog entry at this time. It hasn't been exciting, but hopefully it's been informative. Now I will return to gift entry. Who wants to give me a raise?

Like the Alamo (I should remember it)

Disturb us, Lord,
when we are too well pleased with ourselves,
When our dreams have come true
Because we have dreamed too little,
When we arrived safely
Because we sailed too close to the shore.

Disturb us, Lord, when
With the abundance of things we possess
We have lost our thirst
For the waters of life;
Having fallen in love with life,
We have ceased to dream of eternity
And in our efforts to build a new earth,
We have allowed our vision
Of the new Heaven to dim.

Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly,
To venture on wider seas
Where storms will show your mastery;
Where losing sight of land,
We shall find the stars.

We ask You to push back
The horizons of our hopes;
And to push into the future
In strength, courage, hope, and love.

-Sir Francis Drake, 1577

Oops, I did it again

I judge myself for using that refrain as a title, but it is apt my friends. Oh, it is apt. (Apt...should have used that word when I was losing to Kristen at Bananagrams last night. Blimey. Oh well.)

You want to know what I did again - oopsily speaking? I signed myself up for something, wished I hadn't until the moment I'd arrived for said something, then ended up having the time of my life and wanting to do it again. Now, this generally happens to me with any sort of volunteer opportunity (few and far between unless you count the little kiddies at church) or musical obligation. I'm all trying to get involved and stuff and then I'm all, why the heck did I sign up for this again?...cause I'd rather be sleeping. Well, yesterday I drove out to the city-town of Reston, VA, after a trying morning with the pre-K kids. (It's never fun when someone pees on you.) I had my violin in hand, ready for an afternoon of Brahms' String Sextet #1 with some people I'd never met from the meetup.com group - DC Chamber Music Players. I really was not looking forward to this. I assumed I would be underprepared and would just really stink up the place, figuratively speaking, with my hideous rendition of a piece I'd only listened to on YouTube. Never mind that I could have practiced a lot more than I did. (Don't jump to conclusions. I DID practice...just not that much.) Anyway, I was nervous. It's never easy playing with a bunch of new people. I always underestimate my skill level (it's not that high, but never as low as I tell myself it is) and I didn't want to make a fool of myself in front of seasoned chamber players.

NO WORRIES! We started off with some encouragement. The Violin I player, Joe, said "I'm just warning you all that there are mutliple lines in here I can't play. I'll just play whatever notes come out." He was met with a chorus of, "It doesn't matter" and "We're just here to have fun." Yes! That's what I like to hear! I knew right then that I would enjoy myself. Plus, I was well prepared for the read-through. I knew my part and I only got lost a couple times :). Plus, the music is great. Have you ever heard that sextet? Youtube it, if you haven't. It's SO good! I was playing my little heart out. Everyone was so encouraging of the others and constructive with their musical suggestions. It was just pure fun. So yeah, I'll be doing that again. Plus, it was the most gorgeous day we've had all month - and that's saying something cause we've had really nice weather here lately - and I had the most fun driving between church and Reston and home. Windows down, music blaring, traffic light. (No, not traffic lights...traffic was light.) Perfection.

So it will probably be another month or two before I get together again with a chamber group. They have a couple meetings this month and next that I can't make as I'll be in Tulsa when they happen - woohoo! But one of the violists told me I should pick a piece I want to play in which i would play the first violin part. He said to pick a piece and let them know so we could all play it. I was like, alright! Any suggestions? Any beautiful chamber piece will do.

In other news, I will now update you on the new rug situation. Remember the rug? Quick refresher - K and I were carrying a rug to our house after we picked it up off the street. We caught the attention of some neighbors (who told us to look out for bed bugs) and subsequently made tentative plans to get acquainted. Well, in our perpetual state of silly K and I decided to invite the neighbors over for this past Saturday night. We had no contact information for them so we wrote them a note and dropped it off. The silly part comes here - the note said that we were inviting them over to celebrate our new rug and that they should R.S.V.P. via pigeon post by September 12, 2010.

...

We heard nothing for two weeks. I was convinved that my brilliant pigeon post comment had frightened them off forever. However, we decided we would be prepared for company on Saturday night just in case they chose to show. On Saturday afternoon we heard a knock at the door. On our front porch was a bottle of Resolve and a note that said "See you tonight." Clever, no? So feel free to tell strangers to reply via pigeon post when you write them notes. It doesn't scare them off. In fact, it will facilitate witty gift giving. Now we have some new friends in our neighborhood. Yay!

The Real World: Happy Birthday!!!

Here's a shout out for another Real Worlder (as of 4 months ago) who turns 22 today. Happy Birthday, Brother! I luh you, boo. Welcome to birthdays that are awesome just cause they happen - not because you get a new privilege that comes with age or anything, but just because you're older and wiser and know more about who you are as a person. It's sweet. None of this no-more-exciting-birthdays mumbo jumbo. Every birthday in your 20s is exciting and I am PUMPED that you get to start your 23rd year in style, adult-style. Have a brewsky. Smoke a ciggy. Okay, don't do that. That's gross. Instead, rent a car. No, wait...not yet.

To sum up, enjoy it! You're only 22 once. And your first post-collegiate birthday will be the best one yet. Do what you want, go wild, let loose! Or not, your call. Just bear in mind all the live long day that I am singing ridiculously melisma-filled renditions of "Happy Birthday" to you. I mean, like really bad Whitney Houston impression-type versions. Yay yay yay yay YAAAAAAYYY!!!!! :-)

Niagara FallsVegas

Vacations take work. You might not realize this as a child, but as an adulthood you really grasp the difficulty that is vacation planning. I mean, you have to plan it yourself. Gross! I miss those days when my parents would say, "We're going here, pack your bags" and I'd just go and enjoy myself. Anymore I have to decide where I want to go, how much money I have to spend going there, what I want to do, and if I have enough vacation time to do it! Blechity blachity bluhhh. Who knew that even the R&R times mean different things to adults? Thanks a lot, Real World, with your restrictions and responsibilities. I'll follow you till the end! Thank goodness for friends who'll plan for me :). Well, that's kind of all they can do when we decide to go camping. I don't camp. I don't know the first thing about it. If you want me to camp you have to treat me like a child and tell me where to go and when and what to do when I'm there. Oh, and how to do it. With that said, you should know I had a simply splendid time camping at Niagara Falls over Labor Day Weekend...

Oh, so beautiful! Right?? Look at all that pure, un-tampered-with natural stuff. Why, I could have just happened upon this stunning view whilst on a hike (well, only if I were into hiking and that sort of outdoorsy thing.) But it's majestic and glorious, right? Um, not as right as you'd think. Correction, not as right as I anticipated. Dear gussie was this place a surprise. Have you been here? On the Canadian side? To Niagara FallsVegas? I know a couple different cities that tack on "Vegas" at the end for kicks. It's kind of annoying, too - Lex Vegas (Lexington, KY), Nash Vegas (Nashville, TN). I've spent quite a bit of time in both these cities and neither, in comparison to Niagara Falls, merits the suffix "Vegas" in its nickname. No, indeed! People need to start calling this town, on the Canadian AND U.S.A. sides, FallsVegas cause boy oh boy it is. But I'm getting a bit ahead of myself. Before I tell you about the wonder that is FallsVegas (besides the amazing falls, naturally), let me start at the beginning...

Here were the plans: two roommates and I were headed to Niagara Falls to camp on the NY side for two nights. Friday night - drive to Kane, PA, to stay with a former roommate and her new hubster. Saturday - drive to falls and splash around in them, perchance. Sunday - falls. Monday - drive home.

Here's what happened: Friday at 5:40pm - call from one of the roommates that, in essence, said this, "I'm sick, go without me." What the horse apples??? To go or not to go? That was the question. The other roommate and I went. But starting the trip off like that was a real crack in the otherwise foolproof plan. Okay, not foolproof. We were going to play the trip by ear anyway, but hello! We had food for three, sleeping bags for three, and plans for three. Now there were two.

You know that out-of-body feeling where you can't believe something's happening and you just keep replaying it in your head? And then you laugh incredulously? Welcome to the entire 5.5 hours drive to Kane, PA on Friday night. Two people in a car, randomly laughing in incredulous tones. Weird. We got to Kane about midnight or a little later. We were treated to tea and cookies by our benevolent hostess, and we passed out on her living room floor. (Poisoned cookies. Sike!) Saturday we decided to stick around the little town a bit longer so we could see the sights, say hi to our hostess' family and just hang out with our friend. Great times. I have to say, I really do love small towns. I also love sunny blue-sky days in northern PA when the breeze is blowing just right and the temperature is a cool 78-ish degrees Fahrenheit. Doesn't get better than that. Except when you throw pumpkin chocolate chip cookies in the mix. THEN it gets better. Also, I even loved walking and bear clapping around the pond + wild flowers area in the woods behind my friends house. That's right, clap sporadically so you don't sneak up on a hungry bear! Yipes! Ah, serenity.

Okay, so after we left Kane we drove straight up through Buffalo, NY, to our campsite on Lake Ontario. We got there around 5 or so in the evening and decided to set up the tent, gather kindling for our fire, and check out our surroundings before it got dark. Kristen, the roommate I was camping with, is a camper by hobby. An aficionado, if you will. She had all the equipment and all the experience to make this an easy trip for a novice such as myself. By the way, I think everyone and their dog(s) were out camping this weekend by the falls. I mean, the place was packed. People riding bikes everywhere, playing the guitar and singing. (Yes, it's weird to see someone riding a bike whilst playing the guitar and singing, but things happen differently in New York.) Dogs running around willy nilly. I mean, I saw an RV with a satellite dish set up next to it. People had electric lights strung around their campers and even lawn ornaments planted on their camping plot. Um, WHAT?? I wasn't in Kansas anymore. Cue the incredulous laughter bit. Cue it again. Seriously, keep cuing it until the cue button is broken cause that's how long it lasted.

The tent's ready, we have kindling, we've checked out the view of Lake Ontario (gorgeous), picked up some cool looking rocks for sport, skipped some rocks on the lake (mostly failed at that one) and decided we'd have hot dogs for dinner. On a whim, we decided it would be great to see the falls at night. We'd heard from a couple sources that the Canadian side of the falls provided the best view and that the falls simply must be seen at night. So we thought we'd go over for an hour or so (please, stop laughing - we'd never done this before), come back and make dinner and generally vegg out before night-night. Ahem...

At 6:40pm we got in the line to cross the bridge into Canada. It was light outside on account of the sun. Now look at the picture below. Use context clues to guess what I'm going to tell you next.

Here's a clue for ya - that wand in my hand belongs to a 3 yr-old and she uses it to make traffic go away. "Go away, Traffic!" she says, giving a quick swish and flick with the wand. Those are her sunglasses, too. I don't think they have any power over excess amounts of cars on the road, but it just completed my look, K? You see how it's dark outside, right? Yeah, that was 2 hours later and we STILL hadn't crossed the border yet. By the time we got to the border guard we were a bit delirious and trying to be positive about wasting so much time at a standstill. Okay, we didn't completely waste time. We made some friends on the road, talked to some other drivers, listened to some good tunes, and laughed more...incredulously. Oh, and I felt way embarrassed that I was wearing a good ol' state proud shirt to see the falls. I mean, really?? Can you get any more dorky tourist than that? So the border guard was scary and asked us (may I say incredulously again?) why we were coming over at 9 at night to see the falls and then go back to New York. We sheepishly told her that we didn't realize it would take so long to get through customs and onto the Canadian side. She said, "You should have taken Rainbow Bridge. It would have gotten you there a lot faster." Um, okay. Thanks, scary lady. We put that in our metaphorical pipes and smoked it. It was bitter.

Luckily, we wound our way through the dark streets of Niagara park (good thing cars show how many kilometers per hour you're going) and finally came within sight of the falls by about 9:30 Friday night. And WOW were there a lot of people. We found a place to park (goodbye, 20 USD) and walked through the mist to gaze at nature's wonder. Misty! I should have sung that song the whole time. Wish I'd thought of it then. As it was, I spent the entire weekend talking in a ridiculous Canadian accent and subsequently sending myself into fits of giggles. I really crack myself up, apparently. But anyhoo - my first glimpse of the falls wasn't as amazing as I'd anticipated. As I alluded to earlier, it's like tourism on crack. Casinos everywhere, neon lights, attractions that cost thrice as much as they should. It's a zoo. The pictures below aren't great, but that's what I saw of the falls that night. Shrouded in mist, there they were all lit up by giant spotlights.

No, the falls don't come in rainbow colors. Pay some attention to the man behind the curtain...


We didn't stick around long. We decided to return to camp, cook our dinner and get some sleep so we could come back on Sunday. Kristen was a dear and got the fire started while I watched. Hey! I helped gather kindling! I did my part. ish. We ate hot dogs and s'mores and went to sleep. The next morning we stumbled out of the tent about 9 and cooked ourselves some oatmeal. K-dawg had a sweet stove (think Bunsen burner) that boiled our water so we could add oatmeal to some and Swiss Miss to the other. A few bananas cut up in the oatmeal and voila! Delicious.

After breakfast we pulled out the map and drove off into the daylight. Destination: Rainbow Bridge. I was driving and we found it with only one turnaround, thank you very much! Just like the cranky border guard promised, we got across the bridge and into Canada in a lot less time. 20 minutes, you might say. And that's a generous estimate. Whilst on the bridge, we could look to our 8 o'clock and see the falls, and to our 10 and 11 o'clock we could see this...

FallsVegas. And that's when it's not all lit up and gaudy. Anyway, I must say that the falls did look much better after a good night's sleep and only 20 minutes in line for customs. They are impressive, can't lie. When I tuned out the man-made ridiculousness behind me I was able to enjoy the spectacle of water falling over a cliff. Seems simple but it isn't. It's breathtaking. However, I think I'm getting ahead of myself again. Because after we crossed Rainbow Bridge we didn't go see the falls immediately. Instead, on my boss's recommendation, we drove up the river to a little town called Niagara-On-The-Lake. By the way, that was one of the most beautiful Sunday drives I've ever had. We would our way North on Niagara Parkway, a lazy windy road hugged by wineries and bike trails and beautiful houses. The town itself is a quaint New-England-y kind of town. Lots of shops and horse drawn carriage rides, etc. My favorite part, however, was the waterfront section of the town. There's no better place to be than by the water, in my opinion, and Lake Ontario was beautiful. I could see the Toronto skyline in the distance, and the gently lapping waves provided the perfect soundtrack for a tasty lunch of...peanut butter and banana sandwiches. Yeah, I know. But I was not about to change money over for one day of travel and even though they'd have taken my USDs I was not about to do that and get my change in Canadian coins. Great way to save money on a trip, by the way; just don't exchange your currency and keep your credit card glued in your wallet. Anyway, this is a view of the lake from the lovely town of Niagara-On-The-Lake, Canada.

After lunch and a nice stroll through town, we hopped back in the car and tootled our way South towards the falls. We parked quite a ways away this time (about 2 miles, I think) so that we could park for free. It worked out great, because we walked along the river towards the falls and came across some spectacular views of the rapids and the waterfalls. The water is very green there, by the way. It looks like they put a ton of chlorine in there. That is, it looks almost fake. To sum up, it looks like a maniacal scientist decided to create a wave pool of death at his backyard Mad Scientists Amusement Park. Nonetheless, how can you not be blown away when you see something like this...?

Even after a night in a sleeping bag I was pretty happy to see those falls.

Did you know several people have survived the falls? You know, like oh I'm fishing with my dad and oh no the motor's not working and we got caught up in the current and oh no rapids and oh no get my life jacket on and ahhhhhhhhhhh!!! I saw an Imax movie about it. Gave the ticket lady a twanky in sweet USDs and got back American bills and, wait for it, Canadian coins. Ugh! Why, God, why??? Oh well, Kristen and I pooled our coins later to purchase a postcard at the gift shop. The remaining coins we threw into Lake Ontario when we got back to the camp site. We felt it was important to give back to the community.

Wow, quite the throwing arm I got there. You'd think I'd never touched a football before. Well I have. Fingers on laces, got it!

Anyhoo, that night we drove back to camp and got ready for a night o' fun. Now THIS is the part of camping I like - the part where you make a campfire and eat good food and play card games outside with your hoodie on and laugh and blah blah blah. That's the good stuff. Sitting next to the campfire with your toes as close as you'll let them go. Mmmm, toasty. We (and by we I mean Kristen) made the best fire ever that night so we could cook our hobo meals. Yes, hobo meals. Take some ground meat and season it with whatever. Throw in some minced onion and garlic and just work it all into a patty. Place patty on sheet of tin foil. Cut up some carrots and potatoes. Place those with patty on foil. Get some frozen corn and sprinkle it on top of all that other food stuff. Fold up tin foil. Place the whole thing in the coals of a fire and cook for 10 minutes. Open tin foil, insert fork. Nope, no plate, just you and the tin foil and the fork. And the food. Yummy, hobo-style.

So the trip was great. Monday we packed up and drove back home, wending our way through all the other travelers on highway 70 East towards DC. I had fun. I camped and I enjoyed it. Granted, I wasn't really roughing it. I had a bathroom and shower at my disposal. I didn't have to hike to my camp site; we drove right up to it. My camping buddy had all kinds of good gear that made my stay quite enjoyable. Heck, I don't even own a sleeping bag anymore. But there are a few things that really stand out to me from the weekend. You know, the things that will make me smile when I think about the trip from now on:

Driving through Canada and seeing signs that say "U.S.A." this way - that's just weird. Talking to morose border guards who have enough authority to make me nervous answering questions with no wrong answers (because I have nothing to hide, I tell you, NOTHING!!!). Not getting my passport stamped. (Argh!) Blue Moon and s'mores. Bananagrams (a.k.a. Speed Scrabble) by campfire light and lantern. Skipping rocks on Lake Ontario.

I'm still not a camping buff. Doubt I'll ever be one. But camping at Niagara Falls (Vegas) for a weekend? I recommend it to a friend.

Fire Drill

I anticipated a quiet, calm morning. EEEE, EEEE, EEEE, EEEE!!!! Ugh, is that for real? "Everybody out!" Oh great. Fire drill. Guess I'll bring my purse. Should I bring my iPod? Might as well, just in case. Man, these stairs are steep. Eek, it's awkward to make small talk with coworkers you don't know. "Oh, glad to hear you had a fun vacation." I have nothing else to say to you. But I think you're nice!

Luckily, it's gorgeous outside. This made me happy when I had to walk across the Mall to Natural History to deposit a check. The PETA people didn't bother me this time. They're always out there during the day, passing out flyers and talking to people. I never want a flyer, but until today they always chased me down to give me one despite my studious avoidance of eye contact with them. Today they left me alone. I rewarded them by pretending to read their posters. Once you've lived in this city for even a week you get so sick of people trying to hand you flyers and talk to you when you're on your way somewhere that you just stop looking strangers in the eye. They might want something!

I would like to iterate, and possibly reiterate, that the fire drill really messed with my morning. My cubicle can be such a cave when I want it to be and I was prepared to curl up in it all day today, only surfacing to eat lunch and maybe grab a cup of coffee from the break room. My hopes were dashed when that irritating siren shattered my reverie.

On my way back from Natch Hist (yup, that just happened), I saw a group of four eight-to-ten year-old boys skipping down the Mall. Literally. Skipping. That was pure awesome. Who just skips anymore? And there were no girls around to initiate this type of foot transport. Just the boys, skipping along. I wanted to join, but then I'd be that weird DC girl, so I didn't. But I smiled and stared...almost as creepy as joining in.

It is the most beautiful morning ever. The sun is shining, a few clouds provide some shade from the heat, the tourist level is way down since school's starting and people are on their final summer vacations of the year. It's great. Of course, then I remember that tonight I'm starting my camping trip. Camping Trip. CAMPING. trip. I have no more words.

The Real World: Mento Perspective

I live. I am alive. He told me his life story and my heart beats and my lungs expand and deflate and I have most certainly not been slain by boredom. I refer to my mentor, of course. My Mento, according to Joey Tribiani. Sensei, as some suggest I call him. In truth, he didn't tell me his entire life story. He gave me the "short version" of his life as a working professional. Post-undergrad life as he experienced it. Fitting since that's exactly what I'm dealing with right now. A young professional, not too far out of college, really not far out of grad school and wondering what on God's green earth I'm supposed to be doing around here.

I've pretty much accepted that I know nothing. You know, about life. But somehow I keep learning things as the days go by. I learn about life as an adult, I learn about life in the city, I learn about life on my own, and I discover this vast chasm of the Everything that I still have to learn. At the end of our chat Sensei said in his soft-spoken tone, "I don't know if you learned anything from that." I laughed. I laughed because he was so far off base. I learned. And you know what? I went in to that meeting thinking that I still had no direction for the next two weeks, much less the next six months. Every time he's asked me what I want to focus on for the next meeting I've always stuttered and stumbled over my thoughts as I've attempted to verbalize them...because I never have a clue. I don't even know what I want to learn. Sheesh! But he spoke and I listened. I supplied no conversation because I was listening as he described his journey from there to here. I didn't have to say a word and he spoke right to me. Zing! There were so many nuggets of wisdom in his story that I wish I'd brought a digital voice recorder so I could play those phrases over and over again to myself when I forget...

Don't be afraid to stay where you are. Going from job to job every couple of years is okay as long as you know when to stop, and where to stop. Just because your job satisfaction isn't at its peak right now doesn't mean you have to go somewhere else - it might mean that you need to ask for opportunities here. The opportunities are there, you just have to probe for them. It's always a conflict (for people like us) when there's a fork in the road. Which prong to travel? Where will the one you don't take lead? What if? You shouldn't forget that there's no such thing as a "V" only decision-fork. You know what I mean? It's more like a tree with ridiculous amounts of branches and twigs. In foregoing plant analogies it's more like this: you can always turn around or find another route to get where you want to go next. Just because you take one path doesn't mean you're stuck there forever. It's okay to backtrack when appropriate, and it's okay to change your mind.

Funny, because much of my Sensei's story sounds like my own. Granted, he's had over 30 years of experience and I've had over 4, but there are similarities. We crave change but have an incurable fear of it at the same time. There's a constant internal conflict because we want some new adventure but don't like the thought of actually having to do it. And we're not the only ones. I think many people my age feel that way - us 20-somethings. How many of us really know what we want and stick to it through thick and thin? The lucky few, that's who. Our generation is characterized by changer-uppers. We switch jobs, we change careers, we move cities, we get bored. We're less likely than our parents, and especially grandparents, to be satisfied with doing the same thing for a long period of time. Great - does that mean I'll never be content enough to stick with a job for longer than two years? I don't think so. Especially now that my Mento told me that in his first ten years of work he had six different jobs, but in his last twenty-two years of work he's only held two different positions - both at the Smithsonian and the last one he's held for twenty years. See??? There's hope!

The most important thing, he told me, is to find opportunities to learn and grow where you are. Seek all that out instead of making a rash decision about your future. If you want to change jobs or cities or whatever, do it. But make sure you've taken advantage of everything you can while you're working where you are. In the right environment you can make your job what you want it to be. He did.

So those are the nuggets. The bits o' wisdom. Even after that I was all "uh, um....yeah....fluhhhh" and abandoned all eloquence when trying to articulate my thoughts. Even though I was thinking, I GET IT! THAT'S SO ME! I can't even brilliantly express myself now when I have the opportunity to edit myself. But those are some important nuggets to consider. First off, I don't need to apologize for where I am now. I don't have to know what I want in 5 or 10 years, I don't have to know where I'm going. I don't have to be ashamed of being part of the transient generation in the most transient-ridden city of them all. Second, I have to seek out opportunities. I don't have to think big, but I do have to think. I can be 26 and searching and happy and excited and maybe a wee bit fearful about all the opportunities I have yet to discover.

Heavy stuff, right? I know! I'm all brain-astounded after that talk. I didn't even talk. I just soaked it in like a natural sponge. I was all, whoa dude that ish is deep. I wanted to say that aloud but thought it might be rude to interrupt sounding like a surfer on drugs. Even when not interrupting, it's probably inappropriate to sound like a high surfer in a professional setting. Eh? So now that I've had my mind blown I have to do something with this information....next week sometime. No I kid, I kid! I'm not that much of a slacker (always). I already signed up for a free workshop on grant writing and I've talked to my boss about ways to improve my job. Now you stop it! Don't go planning my 20th Smithsonian anniversary party. I know you want time to make it the best surprise party of life and yes, I would love to have elephant rides available to all and maybe a slip 'n' slide, but simmer down! I'm taking what my mentor said into consideration. I'm re-evaluating my ever changing life plan, and I'm doing what I want. Within reason. Prayerfully considering it all, I assure you. Right now I'm taking steps to make myself as well prepared as I can for the next step, whatever that may be. Whenever that may be. That's all I can do now anyway. And have fun in the process, of course.

BOOYAH!