Wow.  It's been far too long.  Sorry guys, I understand if you forgot about me, it's ok.  To say I've been busy is a grave understatement.  Things with Camp Kesem are keeping me insanely busy.  In case I haven't mentioned Camp Kesem before, here is a website: www.campkesem.org  Sarah started it here and asked if I wanted to take part and now I'm on the exec board.  It's the first year the camp has been at GW and it's an intense amount of work,

In addition, classes are good.  Stressful, as usual, but that's college.  I'm really enjoying my course load this semester.  My Environmental Geology class is really interesting, and now I'm reading Nietsczhe in my honors english class and he's actually fascinating.  His theories on the origins of the terms good and bad is truly original. 

As my freshman year comes to a close (it's a quite a scary thought), I've thought a lot about how much I've changed and matured as a person.  People always say that you find yourself in college, I beg to differ.  I believe that you discover yourself.  You uncover the you that was always there.  The me that I am now was always there, just hiding behind immaturity, insecurity, and timidity.  As a kid and teenager, you aren't allowed to fully grow and discover who you are inside.  The freedom that college grants me has allowed me to cast off my inhibitions and grow.  I believe it's the environment you find yourself in.  You're around people who don't know, who don't know your past.  You don't have to put on a front with them because they don't know anything about you.  It's not that you can be anyone you want, you can just be the real you.  It's not even so much that you change, it's that evolve into a better version of the you that started school.

Ah, high school days.  They are beautiful gold flecks dispersed amongst the murky water that is school.  You get to stay home from school with a completely valid excuse that teachers must honor, your parents cater to you, and you get to catch up on the lives of the young and the restless and all their children.  Your friends call you on lunch asking where you are, hoping you are feeling better.  It's fantastic, minus the tissues and medicine and the coughing and phlegm, etc.

Then you get college sick days.  Not the same.  At all.  You miss your classes and all you really have to do is text a friend to relay the message to a teacher and you're good.  It's on you to get your homework done, you don't get it handed it to you in a nice pretty packet paper clipped together with a post-it attached.  Missing days isn't the same though.  All you do is miss a class or two, each only an hour or so.  It's not as if you are missing an entire, regimented day.  Your friends don't call to see how you're doing.  They stop by your dorm room, buy you food from the food court, stay with you to watch Veronica Mars in between their classes.  At first, I thought I didn't like the college sick day vs. the high school sick day.  Now, I think college sick days are massive, P.Diddy sized bling found floating (yes, they defy the basic laws of gravity) among the water.

I just want to let it be known that I, an 18-year-old college undergrad, am going to see the Spice Girls reunion tour.

And it shall be the most awesome thing of my life.

And I am in no way ashamed of admitting it.

So after being an employee of Starbucks for roughly five ish months, I've picked up a few things besides how to correctly call and make a half-caf triple venti four pump almond breve extra hot no foam latte.  Chiefly, what not to do when you're ordering at Starbucks, or any establishment for that matter.  Things I thought were just common courtesy are apparently lost, and not always to my generation.

1.  Turn off your cell phone:  When you are going up to a register, whether it be to order coffee, a sandwich, or purchase a new pair of jeans, do not continue your conversation on your phone.  If it is important, either say you will call back or keep the person on the line, but for goodness' sake, put the damn phone down.  Do not look at me and expect me to know what you want.  When you are ordering from me, or anyone, that is the person your attention should be on.  It's not just that it is annoying, it doesn't make you feel good to be completely disregarded like that.  If I am being courteous to you, please reciprocate.

I walked off the airplane with my mom, we shifted the weight of our carry-ons, and met my aunt and uncle outside the gate.  After exchanging hugs and kisses and a few hair tossles, we got in their car and drove to their house.  I explained how I loved the city of Boston but not the school.  I explained our itinerary for the next few days: American one day, GW the next.  I stayed up with my aunt telling her that even before seeing it, I knew GW was the place for me but my mom insisted I visit American.  The day we visited GW, I got that cliche feeling of "this is where I'm supposed to be" and knew.  That was in April 2007.

I walked off the airplane alone, shifted the weight of my carry-on, and went to baggage claim to pick up my black suitcase on wheels that carried sweaters and heavy jackets that would stay at my aunt's.  I navigated the airport until I found the Super Shuttle desk and checked in, then rode the shuttle to my aunt and uncle's house.  I was greeted by hugs and kisses and a few hair tossles.  I explained how my flight was, how my summer was so far.  I explained our itinerary for the next few days: check-in was 8 to 10 a.m. Friday and I'd see them in a few days, but I would take the shuttle to and from so they didn't have to make the extra trip.  After a few days, I stayed up with my aunt telling her amazing orientation had been and how I already had a few really close friends who I looked forward to getting to know even better.  The day I left orientation, I got that cliche feeling of "this is always where I was supposed to be" and knew I had made the right choice.  That was in June 2007.

Ah, 2008.  So many things to look forward to this year.  In about six months, I will no longer be a college freshman (eeeeeek).  This year will bring a new president (dear God, finally!).  Spring break in Florida (it pays to have friends who live in Fla).  Moving into a dorm with a kitchenette (so I can bake all the batches of apple turnovers I want without worrying about who is in the basement).  Spice Girls concert in February (in New York mind you). 

I rang in the new year like any college freshman would.  Drinking apple cider, playing taboo, and just enjoying my friends' company.  It was so chill.  We played stupid games and rang in the new year with NBC watching a rerun of the ball dropping.  It felt so comfortable to be with good friends, felt very much like home.  Watching the ball drops always gets me thinking, what are my resolutions?

I don't remember if I had resolutions last year.  My resolutions aren't the usual "get toned" or "eat healthier."  I usually try to resolve to change something about my personality that I don't like, or change bad habits.  True change does not begin with external habits, it starts within.  If you want a new year, new you, that new you doesn't come from a smaller wasitline.  Plus, even if I didn't follow this train of thought, I'm satisfied with my weight, so there goes that resolution...

I'm sitting on a full sized bed on sheets that aren't the ones I've been sleeping on for the past 4/5 months.  I have a 20 inch TV in front of me and a box of Lucky Charms on my desk to my left.  Clothes are strewn all over the floor, I have pretty curtains on my window, and I have to climb only one set of stairs to get to my room.  Yup, Toto, we aren't in Kansas anymore.

After a few delays (including a hydrolic leak) I made it home Friday to surprise my mom when she got home from work.  There were tears, so many tears.  ut it made getting up at 3 a.m. to catch a cab to take a train to the airport all worth it.  Seeing my parents, seeing my friends, its all so surreal.  For so long they have just been voices on the other end of a phone, faces on pictures on walls, names in stories I tell my friends.  I haven't been able to touch them, hug them, but now I can.  And it's amazing.

It's weird to be here, after being gone for so long.  I've been in the same place for months and so used to my little four walls.  Nothing in Modesto has changed, but I've changed.  I can't put my finger on it, but something is different.