First off, shame on me. That last post shows I really need to practice that whole self-restraint thing, because I obviously reneged on my vow to keep quiet about the whole application process. I'm having nightmares that I'll turn into the gossiping Chinese aunt that's in every family (you know, the one you have to avoid ever talking about school with?), which would be a hard blow to my mum, to say the least. And I guess I really don't have Dan whipped after all; he called me pretty badly on that one!
He did manage to get Teresa's site online for me, though, the culmination of 5 months' not-very-steady-work on the part of an un(der)employed college brat and an insanely well-off veterinarian. I'm serious, the woman is in her thirties and shoots kitties with a dose of radioactive iodide (curing feline hyperthyroidism) to the tune of $1000 a cat. I had friends in my elementary school classes that wanted to be vets, and I'm pretty sure this wasn't what they had in mind. In any case, this project was a nice long learning curve, at the end of which I discovered that Daphne does not work well at all in unstructured work environments. Daphne also lacks fundamental art skills and design sense. Daphne remains lucky to have engineer-turned-fine-artist as boyfriend to bail her out of bad situations like this!
But even though I've started looking at Teresa's site again, I can't say my brain's all there -- and for the first time in my life, my brain isn't even in school. For example, I put together a response paper and research proposal this weekend for my English seminar, and I can't remember most of it; most of my life since Wednesday has seen me think (and think and think) about whether the person I've become is ready to make any of the life changes that look so great on paper on first glance. Giving up coffee (which I had started drinking at age 5) was one thing, but I'm wondering if I could even bring myself to leave this city. Dan says he won't let me stay here (which should probably clue me into some potential problems with our relationship if he's willing to ship me off across the continent against my will!) but I'm still missing the sense of purpose I had hoped I would have by now.
I still want to do the right thing. I want to "fight the good fight", as Andrew puts it. I still want to help people. And I really don't want to be one of those people that say that they want to do something all through their life and never actually get it.
He did manage to get Teresa's site online for me, though, the culmination of 5 months' not-very-steady-work on the part of an un(der)employed college brat and an insanely well-off veterinarian. I'm serious, the woman is in her thirties and shoots kitties with a dose of radioactive iodide (curing feline hyperthyroidism) to the tune of $1000 a cat. I had friends in my elementary school classes that wanted to be vets, and I'm pretty sure this wasn't what they had in mind. In any case, this project was a nice long learning curve, at the end of which I discovered that Daphne does not work well at all in unstructured work environments. Daphne also lacks fundamental art skills and design sense. Daphne remains lucky to have engineer-turned-fine-artist as boyfriend to bail her out of bad situations like this!
But even though I've started looking at Teresa's site again, I can't say my brain's all there -- and for the first time in my life, my brain isn't even in school. For example, I put together a response paper and research proposal this weekend for my English seminar, and I can't remember most of it; most of my life since Wednesday has seen me think (and think and think) about whether the person I've become is ready to make any of the life changes that look so great on paper on first glance. Giving up coffee (which I had started drinking at age 5) was one thing, but I'm wondering if I could even bring myself to leave this city. Dan says he won't let me stay here (which should probably clue me into some potential problems with our relationship if he's willing to ship me off across the continent against my will!) but I'm still missing the sense of purpose I had hoped I would have by now.
I still want to do the right thing. I want to "fight the good fight", as Andrew puts it. I still want to help people. And I really don't want to be one of those people that say that they want to do something all through their life and never actually get it.
