Home, but not for long...

I see that I've picked up a few more "followers" .. exciting! I also added an "inspirational quote" to the side... so far I've liked them and I hope you do too! hehe :)

So tomorrow is my last day at home before I leave for Washington. I've got to say the break went a lot faster than I expected, and I'm looking forward to trying something new... but I'm getting extremely nervous. It's one of those situations where I've had too much time to be home and get comfortable. This is also so different from what I originally wanted to do with my semester abroad. I have to dress up everyday and basically have a JOB. 9am-5pm baby. I wanted to do something completely out of my comfort zone and learn about a new culture. Instead I'm pretty much going to learn about how things get done in America. Now that I'm comfortable at home I can't even imagine trying to prepare to go somewhere like India! Well, maybe... either way, this is what is on my plate and I've got to deal. The internship should be a good learning experience and I'm sure I'll be challenged in some way or another. However, I've been getting like 5 emails a day from my future co-workers and it is getting a little bit overwhelming already! Not only will I really have to pay attention to education issues for work, but the real world will be so much more REAL... aka our failing economy and the depressing state of other parts of the world. Think about it, at Dickinson you can get by with your meal plan and you go to your classes which might not be relevant to current events. It's really easy to become isolated in the Dickinson bubble from what's really going on. But lately I'm in that whole "I want to save the world" phase (and I know it's a phase haha), so paying attention to these issues can be pretty disheartening. I suppose that having a better understanding leads to making better and bigger change, but we shall see. I'll leave my "save the world" rant for another time, I guess.

This weekend I visited Dickinson and it was SO GREAT to see everyone. However, I think a semester away will be best. My car managed to die on the way up to campus and I had to call AAA for the first time! I cried and called like all of my girlfriends... pretty typical. But the ending of this story is fabulous because I managed to make friends with the guys in the auto shop my car got towed to (shout out to Superior Towing in Whitehouse Station, NJ!), and let's just say that it's good to know people, because despite my car being useless, I STILL got to campus. I called up a friend who was going to campus on the same route a few hours behind me and managed to get picked up right by the highway my car died on. Sooo after interrogating the Superior Towing night shift workers on whether or not I should take my car dying as a sign that I'm not supposed to go to school at all (their response was something along the lines of "go to college and get drunk" and none of them were superstitious, can you tell?), I sat in Clinton Station Diner for 2 hours, told the waitress my life story of course, and then squeezed in as the 5th person in a 4-passenger car. It was pretty crazy that it all worked out. We are only young and reckless once people!! I was just thinking the other day that I need to be more spontaneous anyway, hehe. Oh, but on the way to school we got a call that someone had been murdered in Carlisle 2 blocks from campus. Awesome. eeeek. Despite the daunting signs, the weekend was very nice and made me feel very loved because I got to see so many friends who are so dear to me!! I'm really going to miss everyone! But I've heard that as soon as you are comfortable somewhere you've got to move on... and senior year is still waiting :)

Check out this article about talking about race: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/15/fashion/15race.html?_r=1&scp=7&sq=race&st=cse
This is a topic I find really interesting and strangely enough had JUST emailed a professor about. How do YOU feel talking about race, do you think Obama will make it easier to talk about? Hmm... and oh! and I just finished the book "A Thousand Splendid Suns," it is a beautiful story, but I don't know how I feel about the end. Go read it though, it really makes you understand how different gender roles are in other countries.

Hope you are enjoying my spastic blog!