Graduate School and Growing Up

So let's see. When last we left our intrepid heroine, she was panicking about the GREs and whether or not grad school was a good idea. Sorry to have left you all hanging, although I see or at least talk to most of you on Facebook, so I'm pretty sure you're well aware of my progress since then. In case you are not: I absolutely rocked the verbal portion of the GREs, did reasonably well on the math and really quite well on the writing. I am maybe possibly nearly done with all of this application stuff. I have submitted applications to four programs at three universities. Biology and Evolutionary Anthropology at Duke University, Biology (concentration in Behavior, Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics) at University of Maryland, and Biology (concentration in Ecology, Behavior, and Evolution) at Boston University. These are all PhD programs. I'm considering adding a Master's program at University of Hawaii, but I'm sort of waffling back and forth on that one.

To be entirely honest, I'm frankly shocked that I have gotten here. I mean, I worked really hard, I have essentially been working three jobs for months, first studying for the GREs and then researching and applying to grad schools. Every step of the way I've waffled and debated "Is this what I want right now? Is this what I should be doing?". And I still have my doubts, but I also have my doubts about getting in to any of these places, anyway. I am not saying this in a humble or low self-esteem way, I just picked really amazing programs at really amazing schools because those are the ones I want to go to. If I don't get in maybe I will be more modest next year or maybe I will try to gain the test scores and experience they think I'm lacking before next year. I know a lot of brilliant people who took multiple tries to get to grad school and I'm trying to drill through my head that it isn't a bad thing.

And here's the thing. My future next year is coming down to this: either I get into grad school or I don't. If I get in I move to a new place (with or without Alexander, that is a whole different thing that is frustrating and not something I'm going to go into too much detail about here) I meet new people, I start the path to research and theoretically professordom down the road. Or I don't get in, I stay in Madison another year and keep working my two awesome jobs and make money and start earlier researching and talking to professors and apply again next year. Most likely (but still not certain) in this scenario Alexander moves to Madison too and we get at least one year of normal dating in before we start this whole "where am I going what am I doing what does that mean for us?" thing over again. Both of these plans are pretty awesome in their own ways, and I realize that.

But I'm doing that thing I do where I concentrate on the bad. I start thinking about how scary grad school is and how I have so many interests and what if I pick the wrong school and what if my advisor is terrible and what if I think I want to study fish but it turns out I hate it and what if Alexander doesn't come with me and what if and what if. And then I think "Well, maybe I won't even get in and then none of this will be a problem. I like where I am right now, Alexander would be much more comfortable moving to a place where he knows some people, I can keep playing with dogs and living within two blocks of a bunch of my friends and just chill out and be a person for a while." But then I won't have gotten into grad school! That would be terrible! And I'd have to stay in the Midwest for another year! And next year Alexander and I would have all the exact same conversations except by then he'd have roommates and a job and a life. So essentially, either way everything will be terrible. I realize I do this. I realize it is stupid. I just haven't quite figured out how to get it to stop yet.

Of course, I could always do something completely different. Maybe if I don't get in I'll just do another SCA internship or some other unpaid internship or travel or work on a cruise ship. I mean, probably not, but maybe.

The thing I've started to come to terms with in the last year, really just in the last few months, is that being an adult is not what happens when you figure everything out and stop feeling lost. Being an adult is feeling lost and working through it, dealing with it, starting with where you are and taking action to get to where you want to be and rolling with whatever happens in between. I'm still having a hard time convincing myself that no one really knows what they're doing. We're all just faking and doing our best and messing up and starting over and making the best choices we can. I've always assumed that there would come a time where I would think "Yes, I'm ready." Yes, I'm ready to have a pet, yes, I'm ready to go to grad school, yes, I'm ready to get married, or whatever. I would wake up one morning and have some crazy insight into life and know what to do and know where I was going and feel comfortable being in charge of my life and confident in my choices as I had always assumed my parents and aunts and uncles and even my older friends were. And maybe sometimes you do have something like that, but for the most part I have realized (but don't fully comprehend yet) everyone is just making it up as they go along. Which is oddly comforting but also just a little terrifying, too. But, I think I can do it at least as well as most of them.

So. Much. Work.

Hey, all! Sorry I haven't posted for a while. My life of late looks like this: go to Job #1, eat lunch while driving to Job #2, do Job #2, come home, eat dinner, study for GREs and/or research graduate schools, go to sleep, repeat until Saturday, visit Alexander in Beloit, then start again.

It's exhausting. I still don't feel ready for the GREs and while I have a couple of grad schools I'm very excited about, the majority all look pretty okay and I really don't know how to narrow it down. Plus, I'm still not sure I'll be able to apply for next year because time is running out and if I do poorly on the GREs that's kind of it. So I'm very very stressed out and by Thursdays I pretty much feel like crawling under the covers and sleeping for a week (the shortening days and increasing clouds are not helping, I feel winter depression creeping up on me. I need to get out of the Midwest).

So that was definitely the point I was at earlier tonight but I spent all evening watching Buffy and putting together my CV (I should have been in bed like two hours ago) and I'm feeling much better now. My CV actually looks pretty good, and pretty full. It looks like Beloit College and my internships and experiences have prepared me pretty well for grad school and there's a possibility I might just get in. I just hope they see it that way, too.

Of Weddings and Wonderful Friends

This past weekend I was lucky enough to attend a beautiful wedding in Virginia. My friends Tucker and Robyn, who have been together since their sophomore year of college (seven years now) were finally tying the knot. I've known Tucker for many years, but for the first several he was one of my brothers' friends who came over en masse sometimes and I viewed with a mixture of curiosity, annoyance, and fear. The summer before my junior year of high school my brother and I finally became friends and many of his friends became mine as well, including Tucker. He is the reason I knew about Beloit and has been an excellent friend to me for about seven years despite the fact that we only lived in the same place for one of those. I don't know Robyn nearly as well but I always wish I did because she is about 50 kinds of awesome. Their ceremony was sweet and beautiful and perfect and I cried like a baby which was incredibly embarrassing. 

The ceremony was fantastic but I have to say that my absolute favorite part came at the end. At the end of the reception line after I had hugged the couple and started crying again (ugh) I snuck away and called my brother in Vanuatu. I told him weeks ago the day and time so that he would be in a place on the island where he got reception and he called back right away. I told Tucker he had a phone call and he looked incredibly confused until he heard my brother's voice and then his face just lit up. It was adorable. He was probably the most excited I've ever seen him. I am still just so incredibly happy that it worked out so well. 

Besides the wedding itself, the weekend was an amazing chance to see a lot of friends from college. To be honest, I was pretty nervous before the trip. Most of these people I hadn't seen in years and while I care about all of them a lot I only got a year with them in college (with some, some of them were gone before I even got there) and I was a freshman so I am in some ways still slightly awestruck and awkward around them and surprised that they seemed to like me so much (definitely not how I felt about most freshmen when I was a senior). I was worried ahead of time that I would be quiet and nervous around them like back in freshman year and there were a couple of moments of that, I won't deny, but they all hugged me and gave me grad school and life advice and let me fall asleep using their chests as pillows and were just generally fantastic people. I had forgotten how much I missed all of them. Whenever I see them (and definitely in freshman year I felt this way) I wish I were three or four years older. Not that I don't love the friends I made in my grade but I really wish I had gotten to spend more time with that group of people. Although, I do really love the fact that there are people like Matt who I have literally only seen a maximum of four times now (counting the wedding) and who still greets me with an enormous hug and wants to talk about our lives and give me good advice as a recently accepted grad school student. It's really wonderful and I just want all of them to live in the same place (but not the midwest, because I have to get out!).

Being at the wedding and seeing all these people who are always just a little bit ahead of me in terms of life stuff made me think about the future a lot (although, what doesn't these days, honestly?). I have friends with spouses and houses and advanced degrees and real people jobs. I wonder how many of those I will have in four years. It's a bit like when I was walking home from dinner with Carly (another very lovely friend) tonight. I love looking in peoples' windows at night, not to see what they're doing or to be creepy, just to see into their lives for just a second and wonder what their lives are like, if they're happy. I wonder what my life would be like if I'd grown up in that house, if I lived in that house now, if I'll end up in a house like that. What things they have displayed prominently enough that a stranger who happens to glance in from the street would be able to see them, what is important to them. It's fascinating to me. I think I've probably mentioned this before but I think this ties into my view of my life as a Choose Your Own Adventure book. I have so many choices right now and I really wish I could cheat and look ahead a little bit to see which one gets me to the best ending. Of course, I can't, and that's not even how life works. I have this huge fear of having regrets in the future, which is just silly because I don't really have any now, so I don't know how I can be regretting things I haven't even done yet. But, it was really nice to see so many people doing so many different things. Some of them were doing what they always wanted to do, some of them were in a completely different place than they thought, and some of them had taken an unexpected path to get to a place where they are very happy. Of course, I only saw them for a couple of days and it was at a wedding so they seemed very happy, but I think they all are, more or less, in good places and happy with their lives even if they're different than they thought. At least, I really hope so, and not just because it makes me feel better about where my life may or may not go, but because they are all truly fabulous people who deserve to be extremely happy.

Movin' on Up to the East Side

Okay, so I'm not actually that much farther East than I was before, but a few blocks, anyway. I have now moved from my tiny studio to a gorgeous three bedroom with two lovely roommates! Our neighborhood is beautiful, our apartment is beautiful, we have an adorable cat and life is pretty good. We even have a couch, a huge kitchen where everything actually fits in the cupboards, and a dishwasher! Also, all hardwood floors. I feel much closer to a real adult.

Of course, I still haven't unpacked everything in my room, our living room is full of boxes, we haven't yet found a table (although Carly may give us hers, at least for a while), and there are some adjustments needed when moving from your own space to a shared one. I have been looking forward for months to living with other people but there is definitely going to be a transition period. I got very used to having everything exactly where I wanted it, whenever there was a mess it was my mess, whenever there was food it was my food, and I never felt the need to nag anyone. I liked all those things. But, I also like coming home and having people to talk to, having a kitty to play with, sharing chores, etc. And I'm sure I'll get more used to the rest of it. It's only been a week, afterall.

Yesterday I finally finished cleaning my old apartment. I spent at least three, maybe three and a half hours cleaning up after I moved out, which doesn't sound like a long time except that my old apartment was one room and a big bathroom. I wiped and scrubbed and vacuumed and I really hope it's enough for me to get my whole deposit back. It's a fairly old place and there were some stains I couldn't get out and knew I didn't cause, some rips and holes that were there when I moved in, etc. and since I was subletting, it's up to my subleasor how much of my half of the deposit I get back, which is worrisome. She seemed like a very nice girl, and everything, but I still feel that it would be fairly easy for me to get screwed over in this deal. Then there's the part where I lost the extra key. I mean, I didn't really. When Alexander was visiting I gave it to him, he set it down somewhere in the apartment (I watched him do this, I was almost positive he put it on the desk) and then neither of us could find it ever again. It never left the apartment but I searched through everything when I was packing and it was nowhere to be found. So. There's that. I'm not sure how much they charge for a lost key. At my new place they gave me a handy little sheet telling us how much they charge for anything that needs repair or cleaning after you left and a key is only $10 but you never know what they might do at the old place and I'm getting nervous.

Moving on, polo season is almost over! Sad. But we've got a few more big games before it is. This weekend I'll be in Sioux Falls, SD, next weekend we'll be in Peoria, and the weekend after that a couple of teams might be coming here. After that it should peter out and we'll probably just be practicing and playing games here, maybe travelling a very little bit. We haven't been travelling as much as I expected anyway, but it's been a really fun (if stressful) summer. These next two weekends are actually the only times we'll be staying in hotels, which will be interesting.

I think I mentioned in my last post that the other girl I work with is nice and everything but we never really clicked, never seemed to have much in common and things are usually at least a little strained between us and I couldn't put my finger on why. I think there are two reasons that can be summed up in two sentences I have recently heard her utter. The first was something along the lines of "it's not like I'm an environmentalist" when talking about throwing beer cans in a lake which just hurt my soul and made me respect her a little less but didn't make me feel like we could never ever get along, and the second was much more recently "I hate reading". "Ah." I thought "Well, that's that, then." Not that all of my friends have to be book nerds (although at least 99% of them are) but I don't think anyone I really enjoy spending time with would ever say "I hate reading". It's not so much a dealbreaker as an explanation for why things have always been weird. On some fundamental level I cannot be compatible with someone who would say that. If you met my mom, you would understand. Well, actually, if you're reading this I'm fairly sure you do understand.

Oh oh oh! I cannot believe I didn't mention this before! My horse is here at last! He got here on the same day I was moving! He didn't get here until after midnight (and I had been up since 6:30, packing and moving and unpacking and hanging out with people on very little sleep for two days, so I was exhausted) but he was in good shape, if a little confused. I saw him the next day and he seemed much happier to see me. He followed me around the arena and stood still while I groomed him (which he rarely does). I've seen him twice more since then and he's been good. He lives about 10 minutes from the barn where I work and this is the first time in five years that he's been close enough for me to see on a regular basis, and the first time ever ever he has been on the way to something else I need to go to so it is incredibly convenient to see him.

He was very sweaty the other day, may not be quite used to the heat here since I think it might not have gotten as hot in MN as it has been here in WI, but he was out in the pasture with the other horses (they introduce them slowly, which I appreciate), didn't seem too dinged up, and other horses were even following him around! This is really exciting because Larkie is almost always on the bottom of the totem pole in the pasture. It's just his personality, I guess, and it's not bad it just makes me anxious about introducing him to new horses because he might get beat up a little more (although he seems to understand his social rank, so he'll probably submit pretty quickly). But other horses were following him around (and it didn't look like chasing, which happened at his old barn) so maybe Lark is moving up in the world, too!

And now I should go. I have to go to work soon, but first it is rainy and chilly and this adorable grey cat (whose name is Bergamont, Monty for short) is curled up next to me on the couch looking incredibly cute. It is sort of ridiculous how nice it is to have a cat on a rainy day.

So. Tired.

Okay I am going to level with you. I have had a rough couple of days. I am in a combination of post-vacation and not-going-to-see-my-boyfriend-again-for-at-least-a-month blues, and life is not helping me out. Nothing really super horrible, so I shouldn't be letting it get to me this much but, alas, here we are. Among other various depressing world events (Batman shooting, navy testing killing hundreds of whales and dolphins and injuring more, Animal Planet's sci fi movie about how there might be mermaids being more important than the actual navy testing that's going on, really hard day at work, etc.) The main thing that's getting me down is other peoples' negativity.

I've never really thought of myself as a super positive person, what with the bouts of depression and anxiety over the years, but I've realized recently that despite all of that I am really fundamentally a positive person (although not necessarily an optimist, that's a totally different thing). And one thing that I find just incredibly draining is being around negative people.

Okay, I know this is a sweeping generalization that by no means describes all of them (my brother comes to mind as an excellent example of not this, I know they exist, but hear me out before you get all indignant, okay?): but I think that my getting just exhausted by negativity is why I get so frustrated with the majority of atheists. Most of the ones I know (or the famous ones who yell about it a lot) are just so negative, not just the "no god" part, but their whole life view. Whether they admit it or not, I find most atheist arguments to actually be anti-christian (or whatever religion they were raised as, most often) and often (not always, not hating on all atheists, want to make that clear again) dripping with disdain for any kind of belief. Which just turns me off and makes me want to go away and take a nap or something. I mean, I am a scientist, I get the whole lack of proof thing, I do. But part of being a scientist is also being open to ideas that have not been disproven. Otherwise, you are just as guilty of expectation bias as people who believe in something supernatural. Since the existence of a higher power can neither be proven nor disproven, why don't we all just calm the fuck down about it? I mean, I'm so okay with getting angry at people who use religion as an excuse for ignorance, prejudice, and harming others, and I know it's done a lot of bad things, but good things happen because of religion as well, and even more good things happen because of faith, outside of religion. Organized religion has caused a lot of pain, but that doesn't mean that anyone who believes in anything supernatural should be judged or looked down on any more than they should judge or look down on anyone who is an atheist. The negativity and the hypocrisy just bug me is all, and I know many atheists who are wonderful people and this is not directed at them (and even many of the ones who do this are wonderful in many other ways), it's just that I've seen a lot of this lately and combined with all the other things it's just reached a tipping point (plus I realized the negative/positive connection). As a note, I am not religious, I'm not an atheist, and I wouldn't even describe myself as agnostic. I don't know what I am and I'm not going into any more detail about it here.

Anyway, sorry for the rant, but I needed to put it somewhere and it's my blog, dammit! Mostly today was just a long, long day, and I've been waking up from horrible dreams that make me want to cry as soon as I wake up which is just not helping. The girl I usually work with had to help one of the other polo players today, so I was the lone groom for 6 horses and 2 players today. One of the horses we were leaving behind cut herself a couple of days ago and it's getting infected and starting to look bad, so I had to take care of that before I did anything else and I think that made us late leaving which is a huge pet peeve of my boss' husband. He is very high-strung and quick to get frustrated with any little slip-up or thing that goes wrong, and today I was the only person to blame. He didn't actually blow up at me which is frankly a miracle, but he was edgy all day and that made me edgy and I constantly had to be doing like 5 things at once and I didn't really sit down all day, except on the drives. We don't get paid for the drives (which I think is fair, because I usually end up falling asleep) but today I was the only one in the car so I was in charge of keeping my boss' husband (who is also my boss, I guess, but whatever) awake and entertained on the drive, which meant making awkward small talk with a very, very negative man for a total of five hours (two and a half hours there and two and a half back). I feel like I should be paid for that. It was awkward. And he is a professor so he talked a lot about university budget cuts and how it's getting harder and harder to get into grad schools because they don't have money to fund grad students and the government is going to cut funding which will make it even harder and it's possible that students will just get dropped mid-degree (although admittedly unlikely). Plus also, once they graduate there aren't as many jobs as there are graduates, although not as bad as with bachelor's degrees. Not helping my motivation to research programs and get myself there. He has a tendency to talk about the sad state of the world in a way that just makes me want to go home and crawl under my covers for at least a week. Once we talked global warming. Ugh.

Nothing really horrible happened today, but I was rushed and mistakes were made and passive-agressiveness was directed at me and all in all it was very tense. All day. I worked from 7am to 8pm. And it was all tense. I'm tired. And the best part is I get to get up and do it again tomorrow! Although now the girl I work with will be there, so that's good, but the game will have higher stakes and people will be even edgier. Oh god.

So now I'm recuperating. On the way home I bought chips, sweet tea, and two candy bars and I'm going to snuggle up in my bed and watch happy movies and eat comfort food and try to recover my positivity before I go to sleep. I'm sorry if the atheist stuff offended you, I just really wanted to express these things I've been realizing lately and I'd be happy to discuss it rationally but please please please do not get indignant and/or passive-aggressive or finger-pointy at me (I'm really not sure who reads this) because I cannot take that right now. Thanks.

Goodnight!

Hey, Beantown!

And so I'm back from Boston. It was a really wonderful trip. I flew in late last Monday and Alexander picked me up at the airport very sweetly and gave me my first taste of Massachusetts driving. Yikes. He had the whole week planned out and kept almost all of it a secret. Tuesday he took me to the New England Aquarium, which was awesome! They even had fairy penguins! My favorite! I haven't seen them since Australia! Adorable. And a giant sea turtle, among a lot of other amazing creatures. Then we went to an awesome consignment/thrift store type place that was HUGE and awesome. I got to spend some more time with his mom and meet his dad. I loved his mom already from the few hours we hung out in Chicago in April and they told me his dad was just an older version of Alexander but I was not prepared for how correct that was. Except he writes programs for a genomics research company which is awesome. I feel like I understand a lot more about him now, and his apparently hereditary humor. It's pretty great.

Wednesday was a mini golf crawl during which we were both terrible but out of four games I won two and we tied on a third. Awesome. I suck slightly less at mini golf! Woo! Then we went out for delicious sushi and swing dancing at MIT! It was Lindy which neither of us know but we could triple or jitterbug to it for the most part. I even got to dance with a stranger for a song so I have a little Lindy experience now. The T (the train in Boston) is actually really nice. Not always the most convenient, but usually somewhere close to where you want to go and really clean. It only freaks me out when it suddenly shuts off occasionally.

Thursday we drove out to a fancy wine and cheese place. I know I live in Wisconsin but that was some damn good cheese. I think my favorite was the Chebrie, a mixture of sheep and goat cheese. So tasty! The town with this cute little shop happened to be just down the road from Walden Pond so we stopped by. I was expecting it to be tiny, but "pond" in this case seems to mean really big lake. It was full of people swimming, not at all what I was expecting. They had a replica of the house Thoreau built and I have to say it reminded me a lot of  a dorm room. Not bad at all! I really need to get around to reading Walden. I've been meaning to for ages.

When we got back after we ate delicious cheese and bread we got dressed up and drove into the city. Alexander wouldn't tell me where we were going but it turned out he got tickets for the new Cirque du Soleil, Totem! It was so much fun. I have a pretty great guy, if that was not already clear.

Friday we went back into the city. The only real exposure I'd had to Boston growing up was the Make Way for Ducklings book which I loved and read over and over, so one of the only things I requested we do while I was there was see the statue. So we strolled around Boston Common, and over to the Public Garden. We took pictures with the statue and even rode the swan boats (which are still incredibly cheap and surprisingly fun). There were even little ducklings swimming in the water. The rest of the garden was really beautiful, too. I wasn't expecting it to be so romantic. Afterwards he took me to a fancy Swiss chocolate shop, which also helped.

After dinner with his parents at a fantastic pizza place, Alexander and I went out to a bar, which was especially exciting because it was the first time we'd been able to go together, since Alexander turned 21. We listened to the bands, one mediocre and one that I liked pretty well. We even danced a little, but I think the highlight of the night was the guy with a silver peg leg sitting behind us.

Saturday we drove out to the Plimouth Plantation. I am a big fan of historical reenactment and they did not disappoint. They had a lot of nice touches like pronouncing the k in "know". There was a wedding in the pilgrim area and we wandered around and talked to several people. Apparently the reenactors live there full time in the summer which sounds really fun but also really hard. Of course, my favorite part was the Wampanoag village. The people there were wearing varying degrees of traditional dress and most were actually of Wampanoag descent, but they didn't reenact. There was a large weetoo (I am totally guessing on how to spell that, a traditional dwelling of the people) and first an older woman, then a somewhat younger man just sat in there and told stories about how their people lived and interacted with the world, each other, and the white people when they came. It was fascinating. I probably would be in there still if I could be. I love learning about Native American culture but find it hard to do from a book, so being able to speak to people that close to the history was fantastic. The woman was my favorite, too. She was sassy and kept telling people to get out of the way of her breeze when they just stood in the door. There was one slightly awkward moment. She was asking someone about the wedding over at the settlement and when she was done I asked her what Wampanoag weddings were like. They sound really cool. They all involve the same elements (sage, tobacco, and water, I believe) but in different orders and done in different ways depending on what the medicine man (or woman? Not clear on that) sees in each specific couple when he/she meets with them. I like that a lot. Anyway, I just wanted a comparison since we had just seen a Puritan wedding, but as she was leaving she came over and asked me when Alexander and I were getting married, then when we said we weren't she gave us a look that clearly said "Well why not?!" and shook her head. It was hilarious but also quite awkward. Especially considering the number of people I know who seem to be getting engaged lately. It's weird.

On the way out we stopped in Plymouth, which is a very cute town. We saw Plymouth Rock (which they keep in a cage, a fact no one else seemed to think was as funny as I did) and the Mayflower II, which was cool, although we didn't' pay to go on it. When we got back we met up with one of Alexander's friends from high school which was very interesting. She was a lot of fun and we weirded each other out whenever we wanted to get Alexander's attention (no one at home calls him by his full name, and I'd never heard anyone refer to him by his last name before). She drove us around looking at different beautiful views of the city, talking, and eating ice cream. It was really quite lovely.

Sunday we thought about trekking all the way back out to the beach (I really wanted to swim in the ocean) but in the end it made a lot more sense to just go to the nearby lake (we got up late and it was supposed to storm in the late afternoon, although that never did happen). The lake ended up being beautiful, though. No seaweed, deep enough for a dock you could dive off of and a huge deep swimming area. I would swim there every day if I lived in Newton. I felt silly coming from MN/WI and going to a lake but it was much much nicer than any I've seen here outside of the Boundary Waters.

Monday I got to the airport early, only to find out my flight was delayed. Delayed one hour turned into longer, which turned into indefinitely, which turned into canceled. We had one of those delightful stranger bonding moments while everyone from our plane cursed United and scrambled to try and find another flight out. Since I didn't have any urgent business I let them put me on a flight the next morning, with the promise to give me meal and hotel vouchers. I wasn't expecting much but after a good two hours in line (I don't even think that's an exaggeration) I got a voucher for the nearby Embassy Suites for a very expensive room. They also gave me $30 for food in the airport, which fed me lunch on Monday and enough snacks to get me all the way home on Tuesday. Not a bad deal at all. I wasn't sure Alexander would be able to see me at all Monday night, since his mom was leaving for Japan on Tuesday, but it turned out she had plans all night so he came and hung out with me in my plush room and the free pool. It was a very good deal, even considering the extremely expensive room service and almost no other restaurant options around. Also, we discovered a show called Duck Dynasty which is essentially real life Beverly Hillbillies. It's absolutely ridiculous and we could not stop watching. I should probably be ashamed of that but it was hilarious.

I finally did get on a plane this morning, convinced the bus driver to take yesterday's ticket, and finally ended up back in Madison, only to find out it was too hot for work tonight, which is both a blessing and a curse. I can't say I'm exactly happy to be back, but I did have a lot of fun at game night tonight and very soon I have to start making arrangements for my move! That, finally FINALLY having roommates, and work should keep me busy for the next month, month and a half tops, before Alexander comes back to town.

All in all it was a really wonderful, fun, and romantic trip. Pretty much perfect. I am so so happy I got to go, both to see Alexander and also Boston, which it turns out is a pretty cool city. Mostly Cambridge, though, I guess. Anyway, spectacular week, happy Karis, ever so slightly bummed to be back in the sweltering midwest and facing an early day of work in the morning. But, you know, with horses, so I think I'll live.

Doctors and Doctorates

So, long time no update. Life has been pretty good of late. I have more friends in the area, polo is going well and taking up a lot of my time. Alexander is in Boston which is lame, but we've done the long distance summer thing before and I'm going to visit him in less than two weeks! I'm very very excited. Of course mostly to see him but I've also never been to Boston before, or Massachusetts at all (no offense, people who live there, but that is just the dumbest of the state names). Apparently he has all sorts of things planned out for us but I won't find out till I get there. Cannot wait!

The one big stressful thing in my life currently is this whole grad school deal. I finally started looking in-depth at programs and so far have a few I really like. Namely: UC Davis, UNC Chapel Hill, Bucknell (PA), and Macquarie University (Sydney). I'm not done looking yet and I'm not really sure how to find more or narrow down, all of these were picked by looking at what research the professors were doing. The real problem is that only one of them is in a city that I really want to live in, and that's Sydney. I want to live near the ocean. I just do. UC Davis is only a couple of hours away and I hear very good things about the city, but Bucknell is in a landlocked state and Chapel Hill is not even really day-trip distance from the beach. I know this may seem like a silly requirement and it isn't one really but I just feel happier when I can swim in the ocean, or at least see it. I don't know why, I'm just drawn to it and I've lived smack dab in the middle of the continent my whole life. I know I posted on my other blog about this at some point but honestly Sydney is the only city I've ever been in and thought "Yeah, I want to live here." There are a lot of other places that I like, don't get me wrong, but Sydney is the only one I've ever actually felt strongly drawn to. Which is a problem, because it is a million zillion miles away from everyone I care about. I really liked the research they were doing, I love the city, it's on the ocean, it's near the mountains, it's in Australia...but 2-6 years that far away from everyone? I have no idea how to make that kind of decision. I have always been terrible at decision making and my basic strategy is to ask everyone I know what their opinion is and then do whatever I was going to do in the first place. Getting more perspective does help, it often helps me realize what I really feel and what's important, but sometimes it makes it worse. I've only brought it up with a couple of people but so far it's only made it more confusing. Either they've said "Oh that would be so cool, you should totally do it! The loneliness will be worth it" in which case my reaction is "but but but EVERYONE I know will be so far away. For YEARS. I can't do that!" or they will say "Yeah, I mean, that sounds cool but I couldn't do it, it would be too rough and I couldn't be that far away for that long." In which case my response is "But I want to! I'm not going to chicken out just because it will be hard!" So, yeah. Not helping. I have no idea what to do to make this decision, other than look more closely at the programs, email professors, and that sort of thing, which should really be my next step anyway but is awfully scary because then it's less theoretical.

 The other big thing in my life has been doctor visits. I don't know why but since I've moved here things that have always sort of been a problem but not that medically significant (so I thought) have finally seemed worth mentioning to a doctor. For instance, I've been given a lot of shit over the years about how often I fall asleep during other things. Alexander says in the almost year and a half we've been together he can count on one hand the number of times I've stayed awake through a whole movie with him, no matter what time of day it is. I slept through classes in high school and college, even though I was taking notes, chewing gum, jiggling my foot, and drinking water I just could not force myself to stay awake. I pass out in the car, I fall asleep in public sometimes, often I have trouble getting through more than a page or two before I pass out when I just want to read...it's frustrating. In college I figured it was because I never slept enough. I don't think there was a week for those four years that I got a good 8 hours every night for 7 nights straight. And in California because we worked in the desert and it was the summer the only way we wouldn't burst into flames during our job was to start work at 2:30 or 3:00am, which meant going to sleep at 6 or 7pm which was just not happening in a house with no AC when I had west-facing windows. There was no way. So I spent the whole summer sleep deprived, too. But now I get seven or eight hours most nights and it still happens. I fall asleep during game sometimes. I fall asleep all the time, and it mostly seems funny or annoying, not like a real medical problem, except that I am a 23 year old woman, not an 80 year old man. So I mentioned it casually to my therapist who told me to talk to my doctor who gave me a little quiz and said I probably had a sleep disorder and needed to see a sleep specialist. I had that appointment today and they want to do an extensive study which would mean me staying there all night covered in electrodes and then all the next day also covered in electrodes to see what's up. Scary and expensive and maybe not worth it, but also, it would be really great if I could just watch a two hour movie with my friends without missing half of it. So. I don't know. First we're trying changing a few simple things and keeping a sleep diary. They even told me to drink coffee which I don't think a doctor has ever told me before. I hope these things work and I don't have to do ridiculous stuff (although, it would be cool if I got to see my brainwaves, and sleep science is really fascinating to me because it doesn't make any sense). It just seems like the silliest problem to have.

 So, that's pretty much my life right now. If you have any advice about grad school or living far away, I would love it. I will probably let you know how Boston goes. So excited! And now I have to get ready to go play polo! It's a hard life, you guys.

Too Much Love to Go Around

So I've figured out my problem. It's not the worst problem to have, but it is frustrating. It turns out that I love too many things. Allow me to explain. This afternoon I biked over to the zoo. I like the Vilas Zoo but it always makes me realize how spoiled I was growing up with the Minnesota zoo, and makes me miss the animals I got to know there the summer I interned, but I digress. While at the zoo I just got this tremendous feeling of excitement. Even seeing a few animals in too-small cages looking bored makes me so happy. I watched the orangutans playing and using the tools in their enclosure for almost an hour. Every exhibit made me want to just jet off to wherever that animal comes from and study it for a year. How stupid I had been, I thought, thinking I should take time off before grad school! I should be in Africa right now studying giraffes! Or lions. Or in Borneo studying orangutans. Or even in Wyoming studying bison or prairie dogs. I resolved to go home and watch Life and start seriously looking at grad school programs.

 On my way out of the zoo I checked my email on my phone, just to see if anything important had come up. I had a reply email from a very prestigious ballroom dance studio that I had recently applied to. I knew from Magpie trying to get a job there that they start out with a quick little dance lesson just to see if you're the kind of person who they want to hire and then they train you for several months and then you get a contract to teach. I got the email at 4:15 and it said I should come to the little intro lesson at 5:15. I have never biked so fast to try to get home, jumped in the shower for long enough to get the sweat off, called to make sure it was okay that I'd be late to what is essentially a job interview, and got there as fast as I could. We did two of my least favorite dances, rumba and salsa (although to be fair, I only don't like salsa because I don't know any moves in it) but it was so fun! I have missed ballroom so so badly. Everyone was great and I love learning new follows and I even lead a little bit and wasn't horrible at it! It turns out that even for the training portion they would want me five nights a week, so I have to put off applying until after polo season ends, which is too bad (although he said they're constantly hiring, so it could be a great thing in the fall!). But at one point while he was talking he mentioned "but you don't need to worry about that unless you're competing, which is 2-4 years down the road". And my heart jumped. Competitive ballroom dancing! I want to do that! Now, I'm not going to say it's impossible to be a wildlife biologist and a competitive ballroom dancer, but it is very difficult and highly unlikely.

I was lead to believe growing up that as you grow up you find that one thing that you love and just want to do forever, work hard to get into that field and be good at it, and then be happy. Not only is it not that simple, but I can't even decide what it is I truly love! I'm sure this is a common problem, and I'd much rather want to do too many things than not really want to do anything, because at least whatever I choose I will be happy. Unless I choose wrong and then am miserable forever. I know, I know, there are no right and wrong choices, there are lots of ways to be happy, you never know how things are going to turn out or why something happens the way it does but I have a hard time making myself believe that. Some people end up with life-long regrets and I don't want to be one of those people. Probably the answer to that is to be the kind of person who doesn't live in the past but makes the best of what they have and keeps moving forward until they find happiness whether or not it's what they set out for but...I don't know, I just want to do well at this whole "life" thing. The other obvious problem is that just about every animal in the zoo made me think "I need to find a program right now where I can go into the wild and study these!" which...I can't. How in the world am I ever going to find grad school programs with interests this broad? I'm most interested in mammals and birds, and I know I want to study behavior and/or hopefully contribute to conservation. How in the world am I supposed to narrow that down? I mean, a lot of people have told me that a good way to find a grad program is to find professors who are doing research you want to be a part of and see if they have space/money for you. I tried writing down all the people I would want to work with from a book that Ken lent me and found that I wrote down just about everyone who wrote an article. I don't know how to even begin to make this decision. I mean, it should be easy, right? If I love so many things I should be happy no matter what? But somehow I fear it won't work out that way. I don't know. Logic and worry have never gone together, I suppose.

One Year Later

Well it's been a year since I graduated from college. It was very very strange going to see graduation this year. I've seen my friends graduate before but this time I was continuously flashing back to what it felt like to be sweltering in those black robes and to have all the speeches be about me. I have to say, our speeches were better. Scotty B (the president) talked about how Beloit College is like turtle sex (the video is up on youtube if you don't believe me), Ben Pascoe handed out milkshakes, and I don't really remember the guest commencement speaker but I feel sure he was more uplifting than this years' who was interesting but also talked a lot about how depressing the world is right now and how it is the graduates' job to fix it. I had nearly as many people to hug and say goodbye to this year as I did last year (although it helped that two of them will be coming to live with me in a couple of months and more will at least be heading to Madison). I also got to see a couple of my professors (for all the time that I've spent in Beloit since graduation I've never gone back to the Bio floor or seen any of the professors, mostly because I worry they'll judge me for my work choices and ask me when I'm going to grad school) but it was much less stressful than I thought. Mostly because it was Yaffa and Carl/Carol, I think, and they seem much more okay with the idea of taking some time off and doing something fun and interesting than, say, John or maybe Ken. But I'm getting off topic. It's funny how the end of the school year seems to be affecting me about as much as it usually did during college (although not as much as last year, obviously). I've been visiting Beloit weekly or every two weeks and so I'm really really going to miss seeing everyone this summer (especially Alexander, although he's staying with me right now which is lovely). Also, when I visit next year I won't get nearly as many hugs or shocked and excited expressions (people ask me why I never told them I was coming down, it's because of how much fun it was to tap them on the shoulder and see them do a double take and then grin and give me a huge hug. That did not get old and now it will happen a whole lot less because I don't know many of the sophomores - who will be seniors next year but will always be sophomores to me - nearly as well as I knew the juniors - who just graduated). So, I'm feeling a little sad and nostalgic and even a little weepy as summer begins. On a brighter note, though, I survived my first year out of college! How exciting is that? I had not the slightest idea where I would be now one year ago and never in a million years would I have guessed I would be getting paid to work with polo horses. I have an awesome job, I will only be living alone for another two and a half months and then I will get two lovely roommates, my wonderful boyfriend of almost a year and a half is sleeping a few feet away and when I finish this I will wake him up so I can teach him how to ride a horse, I live in a beautiful city with friends and more friends will be flocking here soon. It's a great life but I'm starting to get a little antsy to do something else. I mean, obviously I will be in Madison for at least another year, but maybe it really is time for grad school after that. Or at least a change of scenery. I don't know. Everything was always changing in college, I would be doing something completely different every semester, always meeting new people and moving and planning for the future and so it's hard for me to wrap my head around staying in one place and doing one thing for very long. Maybe I should learn to but maybe I should not force it until that is what I want. I have no idea. I'm still very much figuring this whole thing out. But I've done a really good job of it this first year, and I think I'll continue to do that, so everything will be okay. *knock on wood*.

The Beginning of a Healthier Life

Today was a good day. I had my first therapy session in years and I'm feeling really good about this psychologist. It's nothing super major or anything but there have been some things that have been sort of gnawing away at me for a while, and I think this is going to be very good for me. I went to yoga tonight. It was a detox class, which is very intense in a very different way from other classes I've been to. I like it. I'm going to try to go much more often, or go back to dance, or something. Just riding and all the barn work that goes with it is not enough exercise, even though I am tired when I come home. The yoga studio is right above Fresh Market so I stopped there on my way home and got ingredients for dinner tonight: locally made pumpkin tortellini and spinach salad with blackberries. I'm going to study for the GREs before bed tonight (actually, I've been sort of having fun studying so far. I haven't gotten to the math part, I think that will be less fun, but I just really love words). From here on out I am going to be healthier and happier and more positive and things are going to be wonderful. Not that there won't be missteps and bad days, but I think this is the start of something very good.

Life: Going Pretty Well, Actually

So this week has been pretty amazing so far. My mom came to visit which was lovely. She brought my bike which is also lovely. She bought me new books and got to see where I work. I got to be the one who knew where to go, which is incredibly rare. Overall, I was just really happy to see her.

Work is going very well, too. Well, today was not so great. I got stepped on, nearly bucked off, and two horses ran off (back to the barn while we were riding in the field, nothing terrible, but still scary and bad, because it made my bucking horse much worse), and I almost got kicked in the face. Not a great day, but also a great day if you look at it differently, because I didn't get bucked off (actually, I was fairly safe the whole time, I'm lucky to have a really good seat, but it was still scary) or kicked in the face, and my toes are not broken, just swollen and in pain. But in general, my job is becoming slightly more about learning polo which is very exciting and fun and complicated. Mostly I am happy because this is the sort of thing people (including me, if I had the funds) would pay hundreds or thousands of dollars to do, and I am getting paid to do it! Pretty awesome.

On Monday I headed down to Beloit for a quick visit and there had been hints of some sort of surprise. On my way down I got a call from Alexander saying he had been kidnapped by Plains Walkers and I needed to save him. When I got there Stitch and Brianna were cackling evilly and said they had stolen him and I must play them in Magic to get him back. Then Alexander appeared only long enough to toss me a small package and disappeared back into his room. It was my very own deck of Magic cards. I've been playing Magic occasionally for years, since I was little and my brother needed a partner when his friends weren't around. I've never been very good at it but recently I've been playing a lot more and having a lot more fun with it. I've never had my own deck, I've always just used other people's. So who would have thought that a Magic deck would be one of the most thoughtful gifts I've ever gotten? He picked out a playing style and theme I would like (it's elephants!), picked the best and the prettiest cards, play-tested it extensively to get it just perfect, and then orchestrated this whole tournament because he knew he'd have some homework and other stuff to do before he could hang out with me Monday night. Sooo lucky. So happy. :) And for the friends who played along! It was a lot of fun!

And finally, on Tuesday Brianna called our future landlord to find out if we got the apartment and he said yes! I am so excited! We will sign the lease on Monday and then I will absolutely positively have fantastic roommates and a gorgeous place to live for a whole year, and I won't have to go apartment hunting again for at least a year! So happy!

Food Accomplishments and Modern Adaptations

Guys, I went grocery shopping! I know this doesn't sound like a huge accomplishment to anyone else, but it is to me. You see, lately I've been on a diet I like to call "too lazy to go to the store". It's not that I haven't had the money, I have foodstamps (which are wonderful by the way), but I hate going to the grocery store smelling like dirt, hay, and horses, plus I'm starving by the time I finish work and you're not supposed to go to the store hungry. But then, by the time I get home and shower and change all I want to do is eat and veg out for a while/take a nap. It's a problem.

But! Today I went on my way home. I was incredibly hungry and I didn't have a list, which are both things you are not supposed to do, but I think I did a fairly good job of not getting a huge amount or stuff that looks good now but I will never eat. I hope. I'm still having trouble mastering this whole "buy enough food to last you for a while, but not have any of it go bad" thing. I think this will be greatly remedied when I have roommates. If I buy stuff for a salad I basically have to eat it every day until it runs out or it goes bad before I can eat it all. And you can never buy just enough to make one recipe for one person. There's always leftovers and what am I going to do with one ounce of ricotta cheese? Yes, I probably should have figured out something instead of just letting it go moldy on the shelf in my fridge, but what's done is done now.

For the most part I got simple fresh ingredients to make sandwiches/wraps which is a good amount of "making something" for me. It's better than just boiling some noodles and putting canned sauce on them, but not as prohibitive (to a lazy person like me) as a whole meal recipe. I also got berries, because I had a lot of foodstamp money I knew I could spend. I am really really excited about them. I hope that I can manage not to eat them all this afternoon, but to eat them all before they go bad. Bad berries are the saddest thing, and they happen so fast!

My other huge accomplishment today was that I went to the grocery store hungry and I managed not to buy any sweets!...Sort of. I was in the bakery section oogling the doughnuts, cakes, and cupcakes for a while and thinking "I have so much money and it's not really mine..." but! I mustered all my willpower and pushed the cart away. I did, however, buy the ingredients to make cupcakes. I have decided that if I want sweet things I am going to have to work for them. I want to get better at baking, that way I feel some sort of accomplishment before I reward myself with deliciousness, plus if I have that many I am more likely to share them instead of just pig out alone in my room. Maybe. The only potential flaw in this plan is that I bought pre-made frosting. There is the slightest possibility that I might just eat that. But I'm excited about baking, so I don't think I will.

I don't know why grocery shopping is one of the hardest parts to adjust to about being an adult, but it really is. I think it is how we are raised. I grew up going with my parents to the grocery store occasionally and my job was chiefly to beg and whine for the things I wanted and see how many of them I could get, like so many young children. Our parents worried about how much and which of the real (read: boring) food stuff to get, I just argued for more fruit and cookies and the most sugary-looking cereal. And then in college I pretty much only shopped for a couple of necessities (like peanut butter) and whatever I wanted in my room that Commons didn't offer (similar to the things I whined for as a child). Now as an adult I walk into the grocery store and go "Okay. So. Real food. How does that part of the shopping go, again?" And I constantly have to stop the little voice in my head that whispers "It's your money. It's your kitchen. No one will tell you not to get that box of double stuff oreos. And maybe on your way out you should wander past the ice cream section..."

But actually, I've found that shopping for myself I get less junk food than I did when I was with my parents or the few times I did the shopping for the household. I actually feel more guilty about it. It's weird. I still usually splurge for something small, like hershey's kisses, that I can munch on occasionally to get my chocolate fix, but nothing like the ice cream and bars and whatever else we usually kept at home.

I have also discovered that the adaptations I developed for dealing with college are hurting me now in more ways than just food. Throughout school, I worked hard. I also worked a lot. This meant that the few times I didn't have classes or a huge project or anything I needed to be doing right that second, I would lay down, watch a show on Hulu or Netflix, or take a nap. Whenever I could I needed to let my brain shut off so that it could keep functioning on overdrive the rest of the time. Sort of like how people evolved to need to store up any fat they could find whenever they could because it was rare and their body needed it. Now we have it everywhere, and are giant sacks of fat. Now I have free time all over the place, I don't even work full time, but my body still thinks it needs to shut down whenever it can so I spend a lot of my days laying around, taking naps, and watching things on Netflix, even though I don't need to anymore. Actually, I could really use some mental stimulation.

Yesterday and today I've been pretty astoundingly productive for me, but I still go home afterwards and collapse. Right now is a bad example because I'm sick, so I kind of needed to, but I need to start trying to break this habit and adapt to being my own motivation to use my brain. Starting, I think, with studying for the GREs. I need to start doing it in earnest. I don't know if I'm going to apply for grad school this fall or not, but if there's any chance I am I really need to work on studying now. So. This is the plan. At least...ten minutes every other day. Yeah. That sounds good to start out with. We'll see how it goes. I also need to start working out again. Taking a break isn't helping my back as much as I thought it was, and my job is just physical enough that I don't feel like doing anything else for exercise afterwards, but not physical enough that I don't still need to. Yes. So this is the plan. That and get better at food. Starting slow. Sounds good, right team? Okay, ready, break!

Fishion Accomplished!

I have fish! Two of them! One of them is a Black Moor so I obviously needed to name him Othello. The other is a Ryukin (I think) who is tentatively named Puck. I needed to go with the theme, he's one of my favorite characters, and plus this little fish seems lively and inquisitive. We shall see how much of a trickster he becomes. I am very excited because I've never been the sole care-taker of an animal. I've never picked out my own pets. You would think, considering how much I love and want to surround myself with animals that I would have had more pets by this point but I have not. I am both very excited (more excited than I feel normal people get about fish, but in my opinion that is their loss) and very afraid that I will accidentally kill them. But! This will hopefully cure some of my Efficiency Blues as mentioned in the previous post.

Other big news: Tanya, Brianna, and I decided on an apartment! I'm trying not to get my hopes too high because we haven't applied yet (I left a message for the guy who showed it to us this afternoon, but he has yet to get back to me, then again, it is Saturday). But! I can see our life there and it is excellent. I like it a lot and I'm glad we all had the same number one choice. Let's hope we get it!

This past week was great. Alexander came to visit and we played mini golf and went bowling. Turns out we are both terrible at both (our bowling scores were lower than our mini golf scores. Ouch) but I am slightly better at mini golf and he is slightly better at bowling. Also, he physically swept me off my feet and carried me over a particularly large puddle, which was one of the greatest things ever. But most importantly it meant that he was there for a very important phone call.

Thursday morning I got a call from the recruiter who got me my cheese job. She wanted an answer immediately on a lab job that paid very well and was full time, meaning I wouldn't be able to continue with the horses. It was in my field much more than the cheese job, working with cancer and doing lab tests that I did in school. It was tempting, mostly because of the money, and I did seriously think about it. But she only gave me an hour because it was really competitive and I would have had one interview on Friday to decide if they wanted me and I would have had to agree ahead of time that if they wanted me I would say yes (head hunter rules are weird). I decided (with the advice of Alexander who was lovely even though I woke him up to council me, and my father, who was just lovely) not to take it. I mean, when else in my whole life will I get the chance to ride horses for a living? And yeah, maybe I could be happy in a lab job, but I could also be miserable. I know I love riding horses. If I gave up this chance I think 10 year old me would come into the future and kick my ass. When I was growing up I always said I would rather do something I loved than be rich. This is a lot harder to cling to when you're looking at rent and student loans, but I'm proud of myself for choosing happiness. I need to try harder to let go of my worries and experience the fact that I am doing something amazing right now. Yes, I need another job, yes, I could use more money, but I am incredibly lucky and lucky that my parents are willing to help me out to do something I love. I am 23 and if this isn't the time to be poor but happy, I don't know what is. So, that is what I am going to do, to the best of my ability.

And now, if you'll excuse me, I have some fish to feed.

Roommates Wanted

Okay, it's happened. This week I am officially sick of living alone. Just really. Yes, it's nice to be able to wander around naked and put things wherever I want but I want roommates now. I want people to casually and spontaneously be around. I want to be able to see friends without extensive texting trying to figure out what they're doing and where they are and if it's okay if I come over. I want people to be around all the time whom I can play games with (I've started playing Magic recently and I really have been wanting a game for a couple of days but there is no one here to play with me). I want people to cook with and for. I want a real kitchen and a table and all those things that you have in real apartments. I want people around to tell me "Hey, stop watching TV shows on your computer and do something with us." or even just "Hey, watch TV shows on your computer with us." I want people who will give me outfit input (I have been this person at Maggie's place, and I miss it from college). I want to be able to casually remark upon something I see or read without having to call someone, go to someone else's house, or post it on the internet. When it's cold and snowy I want to have people be around without having to trek out into the white abyss. And I want the kind of apartment that there is any point in inviting anyone else to. Basically no one who lives in Madison has seen my place because there's very little reason for them to, and very little seating or space if they did come over.

Don't get me wrong, it's comfortable enough, it's just that I would feel so much more productive if I had a room that wasn't my bedroom to be in all day when I'm at home. I get lazy and bored and I have the internet so I spend inordinate amounts of time doing that. Not that I would necessarily be able to break this habit with a bigger place and roommates, but I could at least, when I realize I've been on Failblog or Cracked for more than an hour, get up and go into the living room, leaving my computer behind. Or call over a roommate and see what they are doing, if there's anything they want to do. I'm having trouble with the "learning to cook" project because it is just for me. So I say to myself each night "Well, I'm hungry. I could try to make a new recipe, or I could heat up noodles and put pesto on them." Fundamentally, I am easy to please with relatively bland things and willing to eat the same thing over and over again, so without anyone else's input I generally do the latter.

Most of all, I'm bored and lonely a lot of the time but also lazy. Or bored and lonely but don't want to text people every single night asking if I can come over to their place and hang out with them. I know it's strange but that just feels weird after so many years of being able to just walk up or down stairs or at the most across maybe twenty yards and find a whole bunch of people just hanging out and for it to be perfectly reasonable to drop by without asking first and just see what there is to do. I miss that so so so much. It feels much more like an imposition to have to text first and see what they're up to and ask if I can come barge in on it. Not that they mind, I know they don't, but it's just how I think. I want people to talk to and hang out with that are just here. And honestly, having my own room in a place with roommates, if the room is decently sized, will be a lot like what I do now but with people, which is excellent. Also, if my kitchen is not 10 feet from my bed, I feel like I will be able to cut down on the snacking, which would be nice.

So, I knew it would happen. I'm sick of living alone. A lot of that might be that my default when I am alone is the internet, and I am so sick of that but addicted and I need to find other things to do. But I need the internet for things like job hunting and apartment hunting. So I can't just say "I won't go on the internet today, instead I'll be productive" because being productive almost always involves going on the internet. And once I'm on, I'm on Facebook and Failbook and webcomics and then it's four hours later and I've done absolutely nothing but open a whole bunch of Craigslist tabs for potential jobs that I might apply to later.

I really hope this whole thing with Tanya and Brianna works out. The more I've been looking at places the more excited I get about it. It won't be until August which really sucks, because I have months more of living on my own and I know I can do it, I just have to try harder. But it's also the tail end of winter, the hardest time to try because everything is bleak and awful and you keep thinking it's going to be spring but then it snows all day like today.

Also, I have way too much time in my own head. My job is largely me alone with the horses and as I'm also alone at home I have far, far too much time to think and brood and worry and then little problems become large and large problems become huge and then I feel less like doing anything and it is a vicious cycle.

Long story short: Karises were not meant to be solitary creatures. But hopefully this will be like Australia and the Tortoise job, where after a couple of months I hit a wall and go "No, this is the end point, I cannot do this anymore, this sucks" (although for both of those it was 3 months and I'm only 2 months in now) and then after that I find that it's actually totally fine and I enjoy it again. So, since I have five and a half months left of this, let's hope that happens and I don't just spend all of it laying on my bed on the internet.

Maybe having more furniture would help.

Horsing Around

Hey so sorry it's been so long. I waited for a while to post because I didn't want to put anything too bitter out on the internet about Epic. I was really really disappointed when they decided not to hire me. I had been applying since October and over the months my hopes had gotten really high. No one I'd talked to had gotten to the final interviewing phase without actually getting the job, and I was on campus for almost an entire day during which I got to imagine what it would be like to work there, so by the end of all that I was sort of banking on getting that job. It sounded like fun and everyone I met was great and I liked the idea of it a lot. But, when I'm completely honest with myself, the main reason I wanted that job was because it sounded so very very nice to not have to worry about money for a little while. It would have just completely taken that set of anxiety off my plate, would have let me pay my loans, my rent, and still save, start a 401(k) and not spend ridiculously lavishly or anything but just not have to check my bank account before I went out to dinner, you know? It would have been nice to be that comfortable. And it's not that the job didn't sound fun and interesting, it really did, but the money was the big thing. I probably could have saved up and taken vacation time to go see my brother, which I really really wanted to do and am scared that I won't be able to now.

But, alas, I did not get the job. I was sad and bitter and I ate a pint of icecream. The worst part really was that a couple days later I put up my resume on Monster and almost immediately I got an email from Epic telling me I was a good candidate and should apply. Really?! You can't take two seconds to check whether or not you rejected someone within the past week before you send out that kind of email? But anyway, even though I am still not financially set, I am glad I didn't get that job now because it led to something so much better!

I had applied to a job with a nearby polo club to exercise their horses and had never heard back, so I called the woman a few hours after I heard back from Epic. She hadn't gotten my email, or at least couldn't find it, but was impressed by my resume (14 years of riding horses) and invited me out to her stable to try out. She was even more impressed with how I handled Remy, one of her biggest horses, and invited me back for a second try out with the other top three. She and her trainer watched us ride and they were both very nice and seemed impressed. I left feeling fairly confident but then didn't hear from them for a few days. Finally I called to check and she said she would make a decision by the next day. I was a bundle of nerves for the next day and a half until she called and said I'd got the job!

I started on Saturday and have been at the stable for at least three hours every day except Tuesday. Most of her horses are Thoroughbreds, which I haven't had too much experience with but are mostly very well behaved. There are a couple who got aggressive in the stall and still kind of freak me out, but for the most part they are a great bunch of horses. The one thing I'll say about Thoroughbreds is that their canters are different. I don't know exactly how, they're just a little hard to get the hang of compared to Morgans. It's weird. By now my muscles are mostly used to riding so often, but the first few days I was ridiculously sore. Luckily, I have a very large bathtub and I bought a box of Epsom salts.

Besides the comfort level around some of the horses (which I'm sure will get better the more I work with them), my only problem with this job is that it makes me miss my horse. Lark is so special and he's getting older and he's far away. It's been a long time since I've ridden him regularly and although he seems very glad to no longer be a show horse I still feel bad. I mean, he's got a good life. He's at a stable where they take good care of him, he's got a herd, he's got food and water, he's got a pasture, Mom goes out to see him, but I just feel bad. I miss him. If I knew I were staying in Madison for at least a couple of years I would move him out here but I just don't know what I'm doing and that is really unfair to him. I feel a little bit like I'm letting him down having fun with so many new horses when he is back in Minnesota. I know that is stupid, but it's true.

On the other hand, I'm really enjoying this job. So far I think my favorites are Aria, Breez, and Raz. They are extremely responsive and Raz is just so ready to go. It's a lot of fun. In addition to the nine polo horses, the stable owner has two fairly new additions: young paints rescued from a nearby farm where the owner was starving and neglecting them. They're very young and very cute. One of them (Tux) is a bit wild but other than that is very well-adjusted. The other (Picasso) is extremely timid. When they first got him he wouldn't let people get near him. He's improved a lot but is still very afraid of people and noises and, well, really everything. He's been lame for the past week but absolutely flipped out when we tried to soak his hoof to help it. I've been tasked with the job of socializing him, which I am just so so happy about! He really is a sweetheart, and he seemed to take to me pretty quickly. I spent a while in his stall today just hanging out and talking to him and getting him used to petting and brushing. By the end of a half hour he even let me put liniment on his bad foot. I'm going to spend time with him every day and slowly get him used to people and movement and all sorts of things. I think he could make a really good western horse eventually. I'm really excited about this project.

I still need to find a second job, but I'm working on it and as of right now I'm just happy to have a fairly well-paying job that I love. It's funny, I've spent so many years paying large amounts of money to ride horses, I never really thought I'd be paid to do it. I'm still worried about the future and many many things but when I stop to think about it, I'm happy. Right now, when I'm not visiting the boy (that is also going quite well, by the way, and we have now been together for over a year! So happy!) my days mostly consist of riding, laying around, and dancing. I know this can't go on forever, but really, life is pretty damn sweet and I intend to enjoy it.

Pictures as Promised

Well I finally put my bed together (I have slept on it several nights now and had up to three people sit on it at a time so hopefully this means it is sturdy and will not suddenly fall apart while I am sleeping (*knock on wood*). Having the "under my bed" storage place meant I unpacked most of the rest of my room and even put up a few decorations. Finally I am ready to show it to people.


It says K on my door. Very convenient.


Said bed, my two large glorious windows, and my very first piece of art - complete with frame - purchased in sophomore year and not used until right now. It is a series of anatomical drawings - the heart, mind, and soul. You may also see in this picture my desk with a very excellent website up on my computer and the plant my parents got for me for my birthday which is now slowly dying despite my best efforts.


Closet/dressing area. I am especially proud of the postcards from my various adventures this summer.


My tiny adorable kitchen. Made slightly less tiny by my enormous organizer filled with appliances and other cooking implements. Many thanks to my mother for helping me put it together, I think it would still be in pieces on the floor without her.


A preposterous amount of dishes and glasses for one person but if I ever get a table I will be all set for dinner parties.


My strangely enormous bathroom, large enough for convenient (if odd) vacuum storage.


My extremely large bathtub which makes me extra glad I don't pay for water (although I've only used it once so far, it was wonderful), and possibly my favorite thing I've bought for my apartment so far: owl bathmat.

So there you have it, the virtual tour of my apartment. Not finished, not perfect, but very comfortable and now it feels like home. I hope you can come visit it in person sometime. And now I believe I shall head down to Beloit to see a boy.

Home, Sweet Home

So I've been in Madison a little over a week now. My apartment is still not entirely put together, but it's getting there. I still have a bunch of boxes to store or throw out, my bed is not exactly cooperating with me trying to fix it, and I could really use some more storage space but I really like my apartment. I hung up my first real bit of art. I bought it at Gallery ABBA in Beloit sophomore year but have never had room for it before. I'm super happy about it. Once things are in order it will be in the pictures I post, hopefully.

I'm enjoying being alone a lot more than I thought. Part of that might be that I'm still getting used to having the internet all the time, and part of that is that How I Met Your Mother is all available on Netflix, so I spend a lot of time doing that, but I've also been starting on doing other things I set out to at the beginning of the year. I've started my NaNo story over and have decided to do it in January instead of November. I'm not sure I'm writing fast enough to actually get it done, but I've been writing again which was the only goal. I've been working on my dad's scarf, I've cooked a little, and most importantly, I started a new hobby.

This weekend I researched places I could start pole dancing up here. I've been doing pole dancing in Rockford with my former roommate for a couple of months (not stripper pole dancing, the athletic, Cirque du Soleil kind, like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZlD2Yt3t7A&feature=related ) and I liked it so I wanted to keep going. I found two places, both are very expensive, one of them has very strict six-week classes and seems a bit like the National Karate of pole dancing places. The other one, I found out, was started by someone who used to do it at the first place. I went there anyway, just to try it out. I went to a Level 2 class because my last place didn't have levels and I just guessed. As we were stretching the other girls in the class said they'd been going for two years and three years, respectively. I said two months, and I hadn't done it in a month. They used stationary poles, I'd only ever used spinning ones. I don't want to sound conceited, I really don't, but this is the truth. I was better at it than the other girls. I'd been doing it a fraction of the time and I wasn't used to the type of pole they used but I got the combinations faster, even though I'd never done any of the moves before and they'd already been working on the combinations. It was fun and certainly an ego boost but I don't know if I want to take lessons at a place where those are the people who have been doing it for years. Maybe the Level 3 class (which she said I could go to after a couple more weeks at Level 2) would be better, but it was still pretty expensive and I missed rotating poles.

So I decided to scrap pole dancing, at least for now, and go to another dance studio I found, only a few blocks away from my house and they do all sorts of different types of dance with sort of a "drop in and have fun" mentality. They did have pole dancing listed but it seemed like much more of a stripper kind of pole. Anyway, last night I went to my very first hip-hop class, and more than that it's the first time that I picked up a hobby without tagging along with a friend or family member or being given lessons by my parents. I found a place I wanted to try out and went by myself. It didn't even really occur to me that that was a big step until afterwards. Anyway, hip-hop was super fun and afterwards I decided to stay for the pole class. They had two stationary and one spinning pole, not as nice or as fast as the ones at my old place but still! For the most part it was more floor/stripper-type-dancing oriented but I talked to the teacher and told her about my experience and she basically let me and two other girls who were more experienced hang out together on the spinning pole and try to teach each other things. Occasionally she would come over or check on us, make sure we weren't killing ourselves or show us something cool, but basically we had free rein and it was awesome. Today I am incredibly sore because between the two classes I basically danced for two and a half hours straight, but I'm probably going back tonight for bellydance. It turns out that I just adore dancing and since I have a two-week pass and no job...well this is basically what I'll be doing for the next two weeks.

Oh! Birthday! I forgot to tell you about my birthday. It was lovely. A little low-key but filled with friends and delicious food (Maggie introduced me to a lovely place called the Weary Traveler on Willy Street and then we discovered that the delicious sushi place on State delivers...so that's going to be a problem for my wallet) and board games, plus it was warm enough that I walked around all day without a coat on and climbed a tree which has never ever happened on my birthday. It was pretty great. Plus, Mike gave me an adorable tiny fat narwhal, and my parents gave me some very beautiful flowers that are making my apartment much more homey right now.

Things on the job front are a little weird right now. I know I shouldn't just count on getting this Epic job, especially because it's another week and a half before I even have my interview, but I have my hopes really high and I really want it, plus I don't know what else to apply for and I hate doing applications. I keep looking at environmental jobs but I'm really not qualified for any of them or they're not in Madison, or usually both. I really hope this Epic job works out, but in the meantime I should probably actually do application work.

Overall, though, I'm really very happy and I can't complain. Life is good.

Why Hello, 2012!

So far this year has been pretty great. I rang in the new year with some of the Madison folks, and it was so much fun. Everyone kept talking about how excited they were for me to be their neighbor, and I'm just so so happy that I decided to move here. With the help of my mom, Sam, Alexis, and Ben I am now all moved in to my new apartment, and with working pretty hard at it for the last couple of days I am almost all settled in, too.

I'm almost entirely unpacked at this point, and most of my furniture is where it will stay, at least for now. I forgot just how much stuff Jason and Gaea bequeathed me when they left for the Peace Corps, and so I ended up with probably more kitchen stuff than my tiny little kitchen needs, but it's way better than the alternative. My only problem at this point is that I have barely any food. I just sort of let it run out slowly at my last place because I knew I'd be going home and then moving here. The day I moved in Ben pointed out a nearby grocery store and I finally went down there today, but it turns out it's less of a grocery store and more of a really expensive convenience store. I bought a few things to tide me over, but I really need to get to a real grocery store soon. I would have had time today, except I also got my internet all hooked up (all by myself) and since then I have been somewhat (read: a lot) less productive than I'd hoped.

Once the last few boxes and bags are unpacked and my bed is fixed (oh yeah, my bed broke in the move. The part that connects the sideboard to the headboard fell out, and Home Depot didn't have the right size screw, so I am trying my hand at furniture repair, and the wood filler is currently drying in my bathroom. Wish me luck!) I will post some pictures.

So far I really like it here. It's a nice size and while it's not perfect it feels very homey already. I'm actually kind of enjoying having this space to myself and being alone, although I'm sure the loneliness will set in once the novelty wears off. There's some more furniture and things that I would like but I've already spent a lot of money (even just the basics for moving in are expensive) and I'm not spending more until I get a job. Although, things are looking up on that front, too! I'm in the process of scheduling a time to go visit the Epic campus! Very excited, but also nervous.

I'm hoping to explore the city some more tomorrow. I've been wrapped up in the internet and in organizing my new place, so I haven't been very many places in Madison, yet. I'm going to get some groceries and then figure out some way to experience the city. Not sure how yet, but a hot chocolate crawl was suggested. I'll figure out something fun.

It's hard to believe tomorrow is my 23rd birthday already. I know a lot of you reading this are older than me and will roll your eyes, but 23 feels so old! I sort of consistently feel about two years younger than I really am. When I was 20 I had to fight the urge to tell people I was 18, when I was 21 I felt 19, etc. I still sort of feel like I should be turning 21 instead of 23. 23 just seems like I should be more worldly and wise than I am. Although, living alone in a real city, even a small one, makes me feel a little more legitimate. It's just scary because life is starting to get real now. It's not my graduation year anymore and after tomorrow I won't be the same age I was when I graduated. I moved out of my college town (but I'll still be visiting a lot, of course). It's scary but exciting. I am excited to be able to make my own decisions but scared because those decisions will be much more lasting than anything was before. So far I've only had jobs and places to live for a few months at a time. I'll be in this place for at least 8 months and presumably the next job I get I'll have to commit to for longer. What if I don't like it? I mean, the real thing I have to remember is nothing is permanent and part of being an adult means accepting consequences, but part of it also means having more control and being able to change things when you're unhappy. I think this is going to be good. I'm positive and happy and things will be good.

Oh man, I meant for this to be a short entry and that so did not happen. I have to go get ready so I can go to an open skate with friends.

Long story short: A new year, a new city, a new apartment, a new me, and old friends to share it all with. I'm really lucky, and this year is going to be good.