Virtual hugs just aren't the same

How Time Flies

Two years ago today I left for Bangkok. At this time I was taking my shower and getting ready at my house with my mom, dad, and Michael. We watched some tv trying to pass the time before I left for the airport. At this time I don't think I truly knew what I was doing or what I had gotten myself into.

Today while I was in one of my PE classes it dawned on me that today was October 20th and that it really has been two years. For the last few months I haven't thought about how long I have been back. I keep telling people that I was just there.  It sure hasn't felt like two years to me.  While I am mostly happy where I am, and glad that I am finishing my degree, although I'm sad that it has already been two years. It wasn't a few months ago or even last year.  I wish that I could hold on to SE Asia a little closer. It may sound strange but I really liked when I could say that I was just in SE Asia. The same goes for saying that I was just in Europe - but I don't know, Europe isn't so close to my heart. I had an amazing time and I will never forget traveling with Katie but it was a very different experience for many reasons.

Being back in school has been hard but I am happy beginning to see the end.  I find that I am older, sometimes just by a little bit, than most of my classmates. I'm in a group where I am the only person who is over 21 and it makes me feel old.

Currently I am frustrated with the lack of time I seem to have. I have project after project and meeting after meeting.  I thought I would free up a little more time if I stopped working. However, these last few weeks I feel like I never really get caught up and am lacking in energy.  The biggest thing that is frustrating me is that I have so many "fun" books that I want to read, but am not,  because if I am reading I think I should be reading my textbooks that I have been putting off. Yes, there are lots of way I could fix this but the reality is that I want to be free of being told what to read.

It's eight o'clock and I am exhausted.  I need to go over my resume one more time and then I think it is time to curl up in bed. Thank you for all the support I have gotten while being away and my transition in and out of school.

A Wonderful Saturday Morning

I have had a wonderful Saturday morning. 

I woke up early and went to Mount Bakery where I bought myself a chocolate croissant and a cinnamon roll. I then went and bought myself a vanilla late. I walked around the Saturday Market while people were still setting up and soaked in the crisp, sunny, fall morning. 

Let's hope that the rest of my day at work will be as peaceful as my morning has been.

Authenticity is a daily practice

I'm grumpy - that must mean I'm back in school

I’m back in school and guess what I’m grumpy. I know why I am here and this time around I truly choose to be here. Nonetheless, I’m grumpy.  I don’t mind going to class – to me, that’s the part I like.  The work associated with it really isn’t that bad.  It’s the feeling of having to do it that frustrates me to the point of tears.  The pain I get in my body from sitting still and reading the god-awful textbooks that are boring as hell.  I’m taking an Intro to Cinema course, sounds fun right – well so far it isn’t horrible but the textbook just about put me to sleep. I listened but I didn’t take anything in. I spent an hour listening to my textbook being read to me by my computer. That hour would have been better spent taking a walk in the rain. I sure would have been a hell of a lot happier.

I’m working on effort versus outcome this year.

I’ve been so caught up in doing well (which means getting A’s) that I have lost what an education is. I’m never going to be graded in “real life” with a letter grade; and guess what, I can’t fail “real life”. Yes, that’s right, I cannot fail real life.  I will get as much out of a class as the effort I put in and I am going to choose to be happy with the outcome.  What kills me is that average work is deemed as a “C” grade yet a grade point average of 2.0 isn’t look at as a good grade point average if you are in a competitive field.  In my syllabus for my Professional Communication class a C is seen as “Satisfactory/OK”, a B is “Good” and an A is “Superior”.  I’m trying not to make myself crazy this time around and am aiming for satisfactory or good.  Superior really isn’t going to get me that much farther in my college career.

When I get depressed and feel stuck, which is mostly when I am in school, I dream of all the far away places I would like to be. Right now I am dreaming of what the Peace Corps could be like.  Or how about getting paid to travel and write about it – but I’m talking about the real experiences… not just the best places to go/eat/sleep.  Let me walk the streets of Verona; eat at the hawker stalls in Singapore, walk the wats of Cambodia – just fly me away.

I have a friend in Seattle who talks about “make me smile moments”. Yesterday I had a make me smile moment.  I was at work and I was able to talk to a woman who was going to spend five weeks in and around Bali. She was preparing for her trip and I got to share all my knowledge about my traveling and what I took.  I loved getting to talk about my traveling and being candid that not everything was glamorous but I sure had a great time while I was there. Travel is what I love. No, I don’t love it all the time. And, yes, I love being able to come back home. But when I’m home I dream about all of the far away places I would like to be.

I could have spent the last hour reading my Professional Communication book, but no, I choose to write about my life and what I am learning.

I have no clue how much I will keep up blogging. I’ve been missing it recently and that may be that I’m back in school and I plan to have my feet planted for about the next year or so. For another one of my classes we have started a blog just for the class and that also got me back on my blog.

And finally, I found a song that I have been search for: “Home” by Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros. Check it out!

Do what you love. Love what you do.

Sometimes life is bumpy but I've had a rocky month

So I was suppose to have my tonsils out on the 1st but had tonsillitis. So I had surgery the next week. Then a week after my surgery I thought I was finally feeling a little better but oh no, things just got a whole lot worse.

A week ago Sunday I thought I was finally healing and that the "scab" in the back of my throat was slowly coming off (as it should be). But around 11 pm, while reading in bed, I thought a bigger part of the scab had come off and instead of swallowing it I thought I would spit it out. Well I ended up spitting out a mouth full of blood. This was not what I was expecting. I went upstairs and got my parents out off bed to help me. After more blood kept coming my parents called 911. The fire department came and checked me out and they called the aid car. For a while the bleeding had slowed down and we were told that it was safe enough for my parents to drive me to the emergency room.

So we went to Virginia Mason. The ENT surgeon had to be call, as did the rest of the operating room staff. During this I was still bleeding and spitting out blood. The surgeon made it in and because I was bleeding so much he stuck his very big hands in my mouth to put pressure on the back of my throat where I was bleeding from. The surgeon wanted to stop the bleeding because I was bleeding so much but also because they needed to put a tube down my throat so my air way wouldn't be compromised during surgery. The surgeon says that in most cases it doesn't look like as much blood as it is. But in my case the surgeon thought that I had lost two pints of blood.

The surgeon patched me up and poked around to make sure that this sort of thing wouldn't happen again. I spent three days at Virginia Mason. Turning 22 was not a whole lot of fun. Because I lost so much blood I am very anemic but because I am young and healthy I was not given a blood transfusion. I am now at home and resting. Doing a whole lot makes me very tired and I have to be careful about how fast I get up... because I can get dizzy easily. I am finally eating somewhat normal food. Soft and bland food got old very fast and I am craving everything I can't have.

When I went to see the ENT about getting my tonsils out in April he told me about that bleeding was a possible complication and that while the chances were 3-5% he had never lost anyone and it was mostly just very scary. Well, I thought that bleeding would happen within the first few days, not a week later. And he was right it was very scary. I'm just starting to process what happen. I don't think of myself as a calm person but I didn't process anything while it was going on. The worst thing for me was how long I was bleeding for and how uncomfortable it was to have the surgeon's huge hands in my mouth stopping the bleeding.

There are no pictures of the ordeal - but pictures of Europe instead.

Check out my trip to Europe! http://picasaweb.google.com/aewdenton

I'm hoping to have an uneventful summer and am looking forward to going back to work in the next week.

Thanks for the love and support!