Job: Acquired! *cue Final Fantasy music and/or WoW "ding" noise*

I am employed! This is terribly exciting! Better yet, it is full time! And it pays decently! It is an extremely silly job...well, the job itself is not that silly but there is no way to describe it that does not sound silly. I blame it on "cheese" being an inherently silly word. But, here goes: I test cheese. So far I know how to test the fat content, I'm learning how to test moisture, salts, etc. and hopefully at some point I will get to work in the micro lab and test cultures. It's long days and it's a lot of standing and moving around but so far (all two days) I really like it! I'm not stuck at a computer staring at a screen, I'm actually doing things with my hands and I get to feel accomplished every time I write down data. It's tangible, which I like. And I get to do a variety of things. Not so much today, but over all I will be. Also we listen to the oldies station, which makes me happy because I can sing and dance a little bit. Also we are not only allowed, but encouraged to wear crappy clothes cause there is acid and whatnot. Plus I get to wear a lab coat, which makes me feel like a real scientist.

The only major downside so far is that it is far away. It's in Monroe, WI, which Google Maps declares is 51 minutes away but is more like 40 minutes from what I can tell. Either way, it is far, and I'm worried about what will happen when it snows because it is on a two-lane back highway. For now, the drive is absolutely lovely and I'm going away from the sun in either direction, which is nice. Also I've started listening to Lord of the Rings on tape as I drive, which was a brilliant decision.

The only other down- or also maybe upside is that I really don't know how long this job is going to last. I am a temp, technically, and paid by the recruiting company that hired me, not the cheese people. When they called they said it would be for a month or two, which is pretty perfect if I can find a job in Madison and move up there (Epic, perhaps? We shall see!) but then when I got there they said they might be looking at hiring me on if they like me and have the money so who knows? That might be okay, too. Although, similarly, I would still need a place to live in January. Either way I can still give two week's notice whenever I want which is pretty sweet, as the other job I was maybe possibly going to get through this recruiting company had a 6 month contract. I like this a lot better.

I'm glad not to have to worry about money right away, and I like what I'm doing. So far I'm having fun and not really mourning the loss of my oodles of free time but we'll see how long that lasts. I still really want to move to Madison if I can find a way to make that work, but I guess we'll see what happens. I still haven't heard back from the far away wildlife positions and I still don't know what to do about that. I'm not going to worry for right now. I have a place to live and a job and even though both will disappear in a matter of months, it makes me feel very self-sufficient and proud, like maybe I will be okay in this big wide scary world, after all.

Also contributing to this feeling: I solved a car problem. By myself. I'm awesome.

Be Vewy Vewy Quiet, I'm Hunting Jobs!

So I have been enjoying my time here in Beloit quite a bit, actually. I've been spending a lot of my time hanging out at the college with friends and Alexander, whether or not it is good for me or it feels like I'm regressing or whatever, it is really nice. I've been having fun.

I have also been applying to jobs. A lot of jobs. I almost got a job, actually. I put my resume up on a website, the next day I got a call, the day after that I had an interview and it seemed like everything was going well. Then for about a week and a half they led me on saying I got it, I didn't get it, I was back in the running again, etc. etc. Finally I found out I did not get it. I guess under the circumstances it doesn't much matter what the job was. It wasn't ideal but it was really great and I am sad that I didn't get hired, but in the end maybe it will prove to be for the best. I'm not going to lie, a large part of the reason I am sad is that it means I have to keep applying to things. The application process is the worst. I'm so sick of writing over and over again all the places I've worked for the past four years and everything I've done. The wildlife positions are nice because you usually just need your resume and a cover letter, maybe some references. For some of the larger companies they have about ten pages of questions, at least two of each, all asking in roundabout ways whether I'm a psycho or sociopath and if I will not show up for work because I have been killed in some sort of horrific sky-diving accident, or perhaps go crazy and murder a customer. At least, as far as I can tell that is what they are trying to get at. Then there are the applications that you have to get online but you can't fill out online, you have to print the application and deliver it in person or mail it or whatever.

I'm applying to things in Madison, still thinking I might try to move there in January but it depends on a number of things. I'm still a little afraid that I will get too comfortable in a nice city full of friends and will become too content working in a minimum wage or slightly-above minimum wage job and put off/forget about my ambitions and grad school, etc. My parents each separately told me this is not a thing I should worry about. I guess it makes sense, since I won't be able to go to grad school for at least another year after this one (I do not have enough time to apply before deadlines, and I think another year off would be nice) so I might as well spend it in a place that makes me happy. I don't have much drawing me in any other directions right now. I have applied to a few other jobs, wildlife jobs that don't pay much and that mean living in a cramped house probably in the middle of nowhere again. That was fun for the summer, I really liked it and I could make friends plus...wildlife biology but also...friends...I don't know. I guess I'll just see what, if anything, emails me back. Wheeeeee being unemployed! Life is scary but also kind of exciting. No. Bad Karis. Life is SUPER EXCITING AND NOT SCARY! I will repeat this until it becomes true.

Beloit Homecoming 2011

Well I’m back in Beloit and mostly unpacked. I really love the house. It’s the upstairs of a house four blocks off campus, old but well taken care of, with a couple of rooms, lots of helpful closets, a very cute screened porch, and a bright yellow kitchen. Sarah is fun to live with so far, friends helped me move in and some neighbors even came over to help and invite us to go to church with them. It was cute.

Visiting the campus was…weird because of how not weird it was. The sheer number of running hugs I received made me incredibly happy. I happened to move in on Homecoming weekend, which I thought was funny and sort of apt. It was interesting because a surprising number of people had no idea I was moving in, they thought I’d just come for the weekend like the other alums. The problem came when I tried to explain what I am doing here. It ran something like this, “Well, you know, I don’t have a job or any leads really, I’m going to start looking for jobs and looking at grad schools, and Beloit seemed like a more fun place to do that from than home.”

Most people seemed to understand when I put it like that, and everyone said how happy they were that I’d decided to come back, but I still saw (or thought I saw) that look in their eye that said “Really? You came back to Beloit? Really?” and made me feel really pathetic.

But why not? It’s not as if I haven’t done anything after graduation. I had a really amazing internship for four months! I had something to do right out of college, and now I don’t have anything, which is the opposite of a lot of people I know who had nothing all summer and are just now getting things. If I weren’t here I’d just be at home, not that I don’t love my parents or my friends from home, it’s just that there aren’t that many friends left there, they all have full time jobs and they almost all live or work in Minneapolis, which is a frustrating drive or a very long bus ride from Bloomington, as opposed to a whole two clubs worth of friends at least four blocks away, plus the ones living off campus and the ones in Madison, etc. Plus the boyfriend on campus, that doesn’t hurt. Plus if I’m applying to jobs in Madison, Milwaukee, or Chicago it means I can actually interview in person, which is helpful. It might be a little silly and self-indulgent but really, what is being 20-something and having no responsibilities for if not to be a little silly and self-indulgent?

I’m trying really hard not to let feeling pathetic ruin feeling happy. Because I am happy. Happy to see my friends and happy to see Alexander, and happy to see the campus and even the city. Sure, being on campus makes me feel weird right now, because it feels so normal. Bounding down the stairs of AST on Saturday night to the sound of Sig Chi’s stereo blaring Bon Jovi felt just like any number of Saturday nights last year. Sitting around in BSFFA playing chess and making fun of each other made me feel like I was shirking homework and should be sleeping because I probably had an early class the next day. All of this made me feel like I was trying to crawl back into a cocoon that I didn’t really fit in or have a right to anymore, but it also felt so good. It’s not as if sitting on Facebook in my room at home, the same one I’ve had since I was seven months old, with all the pictures on my bulletin board of middle school and high school friends would make me feel less pathetic, maybe just more normal because it’s what lots of recent college grads do, and I wouldn’t have to explain it to anyone (because I would be alone most of the time). That would not be better, it would just be less weird, and it’s not as if I’ve let being weird stop me from doing anything before. This is what I want right now, and it’s only for 3 months and then I will do something else. This is a big thing that’s always been a problem for me: I decide to do something that I want to do and then I freak out and worry that it’s not what I should be doing and try to get approval from everyone around me to make sure it really is okay. That’s stupid and I’m going to try to stop doing that. I’m here and I’m glad and maybe I won’t be later but that’s later and I’ll deal with it then. Woo adulthood!

Thomas Wolfe Was Full of Crap

So here I am, back in Minnesota again. Just as I did when I got back from Australia and every time I came home for a break from college I already feel like my amazing summer experiences are far behind me, almost a different life. I don't like that feeling but it happens every time and it's hard to fight.

I do like being home. I love my parents and my friends and my animals (Bravo, my dog, is currently sleeping on the floor next to my bed and I'm going to see my horse tomorrow and cannot wait). I love my room, even if it is still preposterously messy and filled with Stuff I Don't Need. I love the weather. It is cool (even the highs here are about the same as the temperature we got at 3am in the desert on the coldest days) and sometimes cloudy and everything is just so green. I do love fall, even when I am not at all used to it and have to wear three layers to Fest.

I went to the Renaissance Festival yesterday. I love it, even though most of the shows are the same year after year (Zilch said he was going to do a "newer" story and then proceeded to tell one that is on the CD we bought at least 5 years ago). I saw old friends (and missed some others, sadly). It's just...nice. I went to the doctor today, the same office I've been going to my entire life. How do you even go about finding a new doctor?

Here is another difficult predicament to be in facing an entirely unknown future: Where do I want to live? I love the Midwest, I really do, but I'm sick of the winters and I need a change. Over the summer working every day in the desert was absolutely beautiful but every weekend we visited somewhere with trees (especially Sequoia) and water I just felt so much more calm and happy. I think trees are a requirement for anywhere I live. Plus my body and the desert just aren't friends. I could not keep myself hydrated. Once, after I'd been in the desert for three months, I drank 6 liters (almost 2 gallons) of water in a day (granted, a day with a lot of hiking but it wasn't that strenuous) and STILL felt headachey and sick at the end of it. I also love mountains, and the ocean. When I visited friends in San Diego I was shocked that out of the 4 people I was staying with, who had been in the city for lengths of time varying from one month to almost three years, not a single one of them had been in the ocean yet. I, on the other hand, was in the city for two days and swam on each. I got teased a lot this summer for being the first one in and the last one out almost any time there was any body of water large enough to take a dip. I may not need to live near the ocean, but I at least need a lot of good lakes.

Then there's the whole city vs. country issue. In general I consider myself more of a country type of girl, which is good if I want to continue this whole wildlife biology type of thing. But when I visited San Diego with my friends walking through Balboa Park I realized how much I love museums and theatres and arboretums and events with people...the kinds of things that are generally more plentiful and done better in big cities. However, I could never live in a big city that didn't have an easy way to escape the cityness. The only city I have ever really and truly felt 100% comfortable in, the only city where I got that "Yeah. I could live here." kind of feeling, was Sydney. I think a lot of it had to do with the amount of ocean surrounding it, the sunshine, the cleanliness, the public transport, the friendliness of the people, and especially the absolutely enormous botanical gardens. They were huge and beautiful and teeming with life. The only problem with Sydney is that it is a million billion miles away from everyone I love.

The other great thing about cities, I just have to digress for a second, is the radio. God, how I missed Minnesota Public Radio! In Barstow it wasn't that they had a lack of stations, it was just that almost every single station fit into one of three categories: Jesus, Mexican Polka, or Pop Music. Needless to say, I spent a lot of the summer listening to pop and have consequently developed the theory that as long as a pop song is catchy (which they all are) the more times you hear it the more you will begin to like it, no matter how much you hated it to begin with. By the end of the summer I would not even change the station when even the songs that had made me want to gag earlier in the summer would come on. It was a little like being brainwashed.

But really, how do you pick a place to live? Generally speaking many people pick based on where their job takes them, but it has to be some kind of consideration. Currently I am choosing based on where the greatest number of my friends are and moving to Beloit. But where to after that? Should I find another field job, any that will take me, and just go there? Should I move to Madison to further maximize my friend-surroundedness? Should I go somewhere I've never been before but have always wanted to go? Or should I follow Miles' example and travel around for a while, searching for the perfect place, and only settle down when I decide the town I've found is the one that I want to be living in? How do you know where you really want to live unless you live there?

All I know is that I think 3 months should be my limit for actually living in Beloit. I know that everyone I've talked to has told me that it won't be weird and they want me around and everything, but I'm getting nervous about it. I think it's going to be weird for me even if it isn't for other people. Maybe it won't be and I'm overthinking it, and maybe it shouldn't be, but I think it might. But then again, I think living anywhere is going to be weird for a while. Barstow certainly was, living at home for an extended period would definitely become weird, any new city would take a while to get used to even if it were filled with friends. So, I should stop worrying and enjoy my three months of Figuring Stuff Out (followed by a lifetime of Figuring Stuff Out, just hopefully with slightly more solid footing and other things to do as well).

...Now What?

This is the predominant question in my life right now, and I honestly can't foresee a time where it will not be. It's big and scary and immovable. It was a question all last year, when I was a senior, it was a question all through this internship, and now that I am leaving and going back to Beloit, it is a very very urgent question. The problem is, I don't know, and I don't know how to know.

I am very good at being a student. Just ask my grades. I am goal-oriented and I work hard and I get things done. I have always worked hard to get to the next level, and I have always known what the next level was going to be. In middle school I worked hard to get to high school, in high school I worked hard to get to college, and in college I worked hard to get to graduation. And now...what?

For a student such as myself the logical next step is grad school, and there have been many days that I think this should be the next step. I am planning on taking the GREs in a few months, and starting to look at programs in the fall, but I'm just not sure. I do want to go to grad school at some point, and it would solve my whole planning problem beautifully for a few years: first get master's, then get PhD, that will certainly take up several years in which I will have clear goals and won't have to ask "Now what?". It will also, incidentally, be a great way to hide from this economy, unless in the time it takes me to get these degrees it gets worse instead of better, in which case I assume we will all be wearing leather and fighting over gasoline, or whatever post-apocalyptic scenario you wish to employ. More than that, I enjoy being a student. I love learning. I like being around like-minded people. I like living in and around colleges/universities. It's a good option.

But somedays grad school is the farthest thing from my mind. In which case, I have a slew of conflicting aspirations that fill the void: I want to travel. I want to visit my brother and Gaea, I want to go back to Australia (this is an option for grad school, as well), I really really want to see Europe, and so on and so on.

I want to stay near people I love. This internship has been great and I really like and care about the friends I've made here but I really really missed my friends. There is a huge colony in Madison, which is near Beloit where there are even more, and this is near(ish) my parents and my friends from home and of course Alexander plays an important and confusing role in all of this. I really do enjoy meeting new people and making new friends but at the end of four months all I want to do is go back to a place where I can feel entirely at home and be welcomed into a snuggle pile. This is the option I've chosen for the next couple of months, while I try to figure this all out, and I am afraid it is going to be too comforting. I don't want to stay in the Midwest, for one, which is where most people are (although as I discovered last weekend there is a fabulous Beloiter colony in San Diego which is also quite tempting). I think it is fine and reasonable for me to seek comfort for a few months, but at some point I want to chase other ambitions then "hang out with my friends".

Then of course, there's field work and various biology things. This internship was really great, even while it was sweltering and I was miserable. I learned a lot and made good friends and gained an appreciation for the desert and got to wrangle tortoises. I also got to see a lot of the Southwest, which makes me very happy. However, I didn't get that little bell in my head and a choir of angels singing as I realized "Field work! This is what I must do!" which I was both hoping for and dreading. It would have been great for that to be it, you know? But then there's the whole wanting to be around friends all the time which is not exactly easy if what you want to do is field work. I would definitely do more of it and I want experience with other animals but it's very hard to come by, especially if you want some sort of actual wage. Then there are the other sides of biology I want to experience: environmental education, husbandry, policy, farming, etc. Maybe not things I'd want to devote my life to, but definitely things I want to try. But that is, of course, also very hard if you want any sort of money because you need experience to be hired for any of these things, so you need to get experience some other way (ie by working as slave labor).

Then there's the urge to do something completely different. As I mentioned before, I work hard. I have spent my whole life working hard. Especially in college, especially in science classes, especially the last couple of years. College was a little like running a marathon for me and now I am tired. There is a part of me that thinks it would be really nice to just have an apartment and a job and live near friends for a while. Not a fancy job, not a "going somewhere" job, just a fun job. Maggie has been making being a barista sound very fun. Or bartender. Or...I don't know, something. I would probably volunteer on the side, and it would probably in actuality drive me crazy but it has a certain appeal just at this moment in time. But with this scenario there's the whole problem of future jobs and the big gap in time where I did nothing at all productive is definitely going to be a sticking point for trying to get back into biology.

Then you add student loans to any or all of these pictures.

Seriously, how do people do this?

I know I have time and I can manage to do many if not all of these things and I don't need to do them all at once and I know that plenty of people navigate their way through this and no one really knows what they're doing they just always know a little bit more than they did last year and blah blah blah everything will be okay, but knowing and believing are two different things.

So, now what? This is sort of my question with this blog, as well. I made it to help me as I start this endless life-long process of Figuring It Out, but as of yet I haven't decided how I want to use it. I promise it won't all be long rambling posts about the future and how terrified I am, but I wanted to start out with a baseline. I've probably talked to many of you about all this already, because this has been on my mind for quite a long time and I still don't have any answers. This is the state of mind in which I am entering my voyage into "Real Life". Also, if any of you have any wisdom to share that you haven't already, that would be wonderful.

And now I must try to quiet all these things from my mind and go to sleep, because I have stayed up much too late already and tomorrow is another full day of work and then our last trip together, one of the ones I was most excited for: Yosemite.

The First of Many (Probably)

This is something I've been thinking about doing for a while, now. Actually, ever since I got back from Australia. I really loved blogging while I was in Australia; it was a great way to organize my thoughts and share my adventures and observations with friends and family at home. In the near future my adventures will probably be somewhat less exciting than those in Australia, but I need to start thinking of what comes after being in college as a grand adventure/experience instead of THE END OF THE WORLD AND EVERYTHING AS I KNOW IT. It will make things a lot better for me and those around me in the coming months/years. So as if it were any other adventure, I am starting a blog. I probably should have done this at the beginning of the summer, when I really was going off on an adventure to the middle of the Mojave desert, but oh well. I will probably make a post about that soon, to get you all up to speed.

So, there you have it. The beginning of the chronicles of the next stage of my life. Read if you wish!