Happy Summer!

I thought that this looked pretty summer-y :)

Last night, I packed up my things in an assortment of boxes and bags and laundry baskets.  My dorm room was the cleanest it's ever been in the history of ever.  Seriously, that place has been scrubbed from top to bottom.  My dad and I loaded up my things into the car (one trip!  Woo!  Or at least it would have been had I not needed to come back for check-out and later to retrieve food that I had forgotten) and drove the (comparatively) short distance home.

Today, I left my house around noon to return to campus for my anthropology final (the last one of the semester).  Two hours of writing later, I am finished.  I have successfully completed my second semester of college!  So now, I'm halfway through my sophomore year (because of the credits I brought with me from high school).

I don't know what to say.

This past year has been the most emotional school year by far.  High school was never like this.  Never has balance been more critical to achieve, even partially.  I have been challenged on several fronts this past year and I've managed to survive them all this time around.

A second year is in my future, but for now, I'm going to settle just a little bit.  I have one class this summer and I'm working as an on-campus gardener!  I'm definitely going to be busy and it's going to be wonderful.

Happy Summer to you and good luck with finals if there is anyone left that fits into this category!

Thanks for Reading!

--Jude

College Adventures: Thinking About the Future Again--Study Abroad

In about a year and a half, I am planning on embarking on one of the biggest challenges and adventures I think I will ever experience.  I will study abroad in the Netherlands, hopefully living in Leiden (check the map).

This trip is so far away, but I get waves of longing to be over there, even though I've never visited the country.  I don't know the language (Dutch) or really any history, but there's nothing like complete cultural and linguistic immersion!  Right?

I've been thinking about it, and this trip could potentially be a 5-6 country trip.  The tentative plan is that my family will fly across the Atlantic with me around Christmas and we'll spend some time in France, visiting our family friends, the Dhermands, and if possible, the other girl we hosted, Clementine.  Maybe even the family who hosted me a little over a year ago, though this may be a little bit of a challenge.  I haven't really spoken French with anyone since that time (I've been trying to write letters in order to keep up my French language skills).  French club will be a must next year!  It has to be.  Besides the fact that I haven't spoken French in a while, my sister is proficient in Spanish, my mom knows a handful of words and phrases, and my dad... I think he took German in high school.  The family who hosted me knows bits and pieces of English, though my host sister was excellent at consoling my homesickness in English, which I greatly appreciated.

My mom was talking about visiting England and/or Ireland, but I haven't heard anything more about this plan.  So who knows!

My boyfriend, as a reward for graduating high school will be visiting Germany for a week (?) three years after his graduation.  He would have traveled there last summer, but once he found that I was planning on studying abroad, he wanted to be able to see me before he wouldn't see me for three or four months.  So while he's spending time in Germany, I'll come and visit him.

After spending time with my family and my boyfriend, I will truly be on my own until I make friends at my college in the Netherlands.  The college that I'm looking to apply to for a semester is for international students (it's really strange thinking of myself as an international student, because I've never really been one of those before).

If all goes well during the application process, I will be living in Leiden.  My understanding is that it's a University town, which could be fun!  It's much smaller than the city I'm used to living in.  Any way, while I'm here, I'll have a two week Dutch language learning intensive course and then school will start (I might keep up Dutch for the semester... it sounds really neat!  A cross between English and German.  It's actually sounds kind of cute).

Because we're a school of international students, it's rumored on the website that there's usually a three day excursion to Belgium, so I'll probably be headed there, which will be great!

I still have a spring break while I'm there, so during that time, I really want to make the journey to Poland so that I can visit Warsaw, Krakow, and see Auschwitz with my own eyes.

I've got a lot of saving to do and tons of extra planning, but I think it will be so worth it!  I am very excited!

Thanks for Reading!

--Jude

College Adventures: The State of My Brain

The last time I wrote on this blog in a similar format to this, on 16 December, I was in distress.  So I thought that I'd write again to update you on the state of my brain.

On 16 December, I was working at Barnes and Noble, I was waking up in the middle of the night due to my aforementioned job, I was preparing for my finals, I was struggling to make my Christmas plans work, and I was having a mental break-down because of all of these things mashed together into one not-so-nice personal situation.

Today, 13 January, things are much, much different.  I am no longer working at Barnes and Noble (for a variety of reasons that I won't share here).  Generally, I'm sleeping through the night.  I only wake up because I'm not tired any more.  Also, I'm getting enough sleep at night!  My Christmas plans have come and gone by now, but I'm proud to say that I made everything work, even though there were some times that were less than ideal.  I managed to get through it and I'm fine now.  My brain is no longer in crisis mode.

So what's going on now?  

After making the decision to leave Barnes and Noble, I had to work on finding something else to do, because I still need a job.  While weighing my options, I decided that it would be a lot better for me to have a job on campus that would actually stick to a 10-20 hours a week schedule.  While I still don't have such a job procured yet, I am hopeful because I applied for two on-campus jobs.  One of them would let me work in the Admissions Office.  It would be a lot of office work, but I would also be giving tours to prospective students at my college.  When I read the job description, I thought that it was perfect because it combined several of the skills I've acquired from Barnes and Noble as well as Minneapolis Public Schools.  I tried to stress that in my application.  The other job I applied for was originally going to be a month long, but right after I applied, they changed it to last the entire semester, which just worked out so well for me.  That job is with the Education Department.  I understand that it is going to be a lot of office work, but I am not complaining.  I'm hoping to hear something (good news or bad) from either of these jobs, but if I don't, I still have the option of finding a nannying job.  My second semester schedule is very open, so I think it will be really easy to accommodate a family into my schedule.  And I know that I'd enjoy the job immensely.

I don't wake up in the middle of the night feeling the need to go through my cash register schpeel at Barnes and Noble.  This is an absolutely amazing feeling to me!  I hated the monotony while working the cash register.  That monotony was so monotonous that it infiltrated my sleep and my brain would become confused.  Typically, I'm asleep by midnight and I fall asleep fast.  It's a glorious feeling!

My classes don't start until 4 February, because my college observes a J-Term.  I couldn't find a class to take because they filled up so darn fast, but that doesn't mean that I'm not keeping busy!  I contacted my principal from elementary and middle school (who is no longer the principal of my old middle school) and he is letting my come to the new school where he is principal so that I can volunteer.  When I am done with my undergraduate studies, I'll be certified to teach English in grades 5-12, so I'm volunteering in the fifth grade class, since they are the oldest kids at this new school (it's only K-5).  The kids there are absolutely wonderful and I come away with so many laughs.  I help teach math (I'm struggling with division... I've been spoiled by calculators) and I also help with reading and spelling.  I'm only volunteering, but I'm still a sort of teacher to some of these kids and it feels awesome!  I love what I do here.  I wake up early, but I don't even care.  My days goes so quickly and I'm never bored.  There's always something to do!  I can't wait to spend the rest of my life doing this.

I am feeling great about my life right now.  I had tough decisions to make about a month ago, but I think that I made the right decisions for myself.  I have no regrets.

College Adventures: Tough Decisions

Hello there!

Do you remember me?  I definitely haven't been much of a presence on this blog, but trust me, I still receive your comments and I'm still lurking in the shadows.

Life has been incredibly busy here.  I have finals on the 19th and 20th of December, I've been struggling to make my Christmas plans work (it's been complicated because of my job), and I've kind of been having a bit of a mental break-down because of all of these things happening at once.  I have called my boyfriend in tears as well as my own mother.  I almost cried in front of my boss due to frustration.  I have woken up in the middle of the night after a few hours of restless dreaming and I've just wanted to cry.

I don't think I've ever felt this way or come this close to an actual break-down.

Perhaps it's poor timing, perhaps it's a lack of communication from a variety of parties, perhaps it's my own inability to set limits for myself.

With the New Year and a new semester coming up, I think it's time to at least consider a change.  It's definitely a pre-meditated change, a week or two in the making, but I think it's a step that I must make in order to keep my sanity and do my very best in school, because school is my priority at this point in my life.

I love having a job and the place where I work is, for the most part, pretty great.  There are a few problems that I have with it, but it's very much related to being a full-time undergraduate student.  I won't go into detail about that here though.  Besides these problems, I'm having trouble balancing everything.  I have been procrastinating more than I usually do (doing things the day of as opposed to a night or two before the due-date) and because of this, I feel like I'm not doing as well of a job as I know that I am capable of doing.

These things are the most critical parts of my decision, but then I thought of this: I am also missing out on many, many experiences in college.  I have a friend that has asked me on several occasions if I would go swing dancing with her, but I've always had to say no because I work on the days this usually takes place.  I want to be able to say "Yes!!" for once.  Not only this, but I don't think I've been able to foster my friendships very well.  I have met so many wonderful people, but I haven't been able to make memories with them or get to know them better because I'm never around.

So I have to make some tough decisions.  I think that no matter what my decision ultimately is that I can make it work and it will be very beneficial to me.  I need to learn to accept that I cannot make everyone happy at the same time and I need to learn what my limits are.  I need to learn more about sacrifice and compromise.  I need to learn how to be more assertive (I've been very bad at that and that's a big reason why I've gotten myself into this predicament).

If you'd like to share, what are some difficult decisions that you've had to make?  How did you come to a conclusion for your problem?  How did you go about acting on this decision?  I could use all the help I can get...

Thank you for reading!  I will try to post more reviews soon.  After finals are over, I will have a lot more time to just sit and read.

--Jude

College Adventures: Stuck

I'm in college, but a number of my friends are still in my general vicinity.  One night I was talking to my boyfriend, Jack, and I told him that The Avengers was playing on the big screen on campus and that he was totally welcome to come.  My friend Avery was already coming over to see the movie as well.  She came over right after her school ended, I fed her, we got to hang out for a while, and then we went to pick up Jack at the front gate (it's a little intimidating be the "only" dude on an all-girls campus) so that we could go to the movie.

So we went to the movie and had the loveliest of times-- The Avengers was really good and even funny at times!  Sadly, Avery had to go home, so we all went down to the bus stop and waited with her until her bus came so that she wouldn't be kidnapped by creepers (not that that's too big of a problem in my area, but still, safety first!).  We got her on the bus with no problems and she let me know when she was back home.

But Jack was still there.  I told him that he was welcome to stay longer if he'd like.  And he did!  So I brought him back to my dorm and we watched cartoons and talked.  Finally, it was around 11 or midnight, so Jack decided that it would probably be best to start heading back to his own campus.  So I walked down to the bus stop again and we waited.

And waited.

And, you know, did a little more waiting.

We waited at the bus stop for ten minutes before we decided that maybe it would be a good idea to check the schedule.  Okay, it said 11:30, so no problem.  There was still a little bit of time.

11:30 rolls by and the bus is still not here.  That's okay, the buses tend to run a few minutes late.

We wait until 11:45.  Okay, something is wrong...

We check the schedule again and we realize the error of our ways: it said 11:30 AM.  Not PM.  The bus Jack was waiting for had stopped running around 6:30PM, which was when Jack arrived on my campus in the first place.  It wouldn't start running again until 5AM.  So, what were we going to do?

On any other campus this wouldn't be a problem.  Jack would have stayed in my dorm for the night, gotten up at 5AM or later in order to catch the bus (except that wasn't possible either-- the bus in question doesn't run on weekends... but I didn't know that at the time) and get back to campus, and everything would have been dandy.  But the rules on my campus are slightly different just because it's an all-girls school.  We have male visiting hours.  They last from 9AM to 2AM, after that, if you're caught with a boy in your room (not that our rooms are searched like in prison), you both get in trouble.  So Jack needed to get back, but we were running out of ideas.  He didn't know anyone on campus that had a car that could come pick him up, we didn't know of any other buses he could take (we know what they are now), and his family wasn't picking up (because they're normal human beings who are asleep at midnight).  We got the number for a taxi as a last resort, but Jack decided to call his family one more time.  And he finally got hold of his dad.  His dad came and picked him up from my campus and brought him back to his own campus-- it turned into a bit of a laughing matter and it wasn't really a big deal.

Fast forward to the very next week.  We decide that it's my turn to come and visit Jack at his campus.  I take the bus that drops me off right in front of Jack's dorm and everything is dandy.  We go across the river and explore that area, having dinner, and then coming back to Jack's dorm to watch some My Little Pony.  It starts to get late.  I look up buses that I can take and I find a route, so around 10PM, we're down at the bus stop waiting.  I get on the bus knowing that I'm looking for Snelling Avenue.  It's supposed to take maybe two minutes to get there on the bus.  But ten minutes pass and I haven't seen Snelling nor have I heard the bus driver call it out.  I decide to ask him.  Apparently Snelling passed a long time ago.  I must be tired, I didn't even hear it!  It turns out I was headed to Downtown Minneapolis in a bus filled with ready-to-party college students.  I was headed in the wrong direction.  So the very helpful bus driver tells me how to get myself turned around, letting me off in a very brightly lit area with a lot of police roaming around.  Nothing had happened, it's just that a lot of college students go out drinking on the weekends.  It's the thing to do, I guess.

So I get on the bus with the same number, but heading in the right direction this time.  I reach Snelling, I get off, and I head to the first bus shelter that I see.  There's no schedule for the next bus that I need.  I figure that I must be in the wrong place again.  By now, I'm fighting back tears because I'm scared and tired... so I call Jack and ask him if I could possibly come back to his dorm to figure things out.  Of course that's okay, so I head back and we go to the lounge where he and another friend are playing Magic: The Gathering.  It's a confusing game and I'm still panicking about what I'm supposed to do, so I hardly pay attention.

You're probably thinking, Jude, just spend the night and figure things out in the morning.  Yeah, ordinarily, I probably would have done that, but for the first month of school, I had class on Saturdays.  Bad luck.  So I needed to be back.  I decided to call my family and see if anyone was awake.  By sheer luck, my mom was up and just heading to bed.  She didn't sound very happy with me on the phone when I called telling her that I was stuck and that I needed help getting back to campus.

"Didn't you just go through this last week?" she asked.

"Yeah..."  Super embarrassing, even if I wasn't the one who was stuck on a foreign campus.

My wonderful mother pulled on a jacket, got in the car, and drove all the way to Jack's campus to pick me up and bring me back to my own campus.  She told me that she was having trouble getting mad at me, especially when I told her what had happened.  She was glad that I felt comfortable enough calling home and asking for help.

So, moral of the story, be really nice to your parents because they're awesome at fixing problems and being solutions.

College Adventures: Going to a Play!

Last week, a new friend of mine and I decided to go and see the play that Miss Ezra Zee was performing in!  It was Much Ado About Nothing by Shakespeare.  Very good, from what I saw (I'll get to that part) and I'll definitely have to read it and then see the whole thing.

So my friend, whose name is Marlee, happened to have her mother's car for the weekend, which worked out nicely.  We were both very excited for the play!  It was on a Thursday, so I had only one class in the morning and she had work in the afternoon, but this still happened to work.  I thought that I told her that the play started at 7pm, but I guess that she heard me say 7:30pm, so we set off at about quarter to seven.  I didn't think anything of it, I just thought that our destination was closer to us than I initially thought.  Marlee had looked up directions on Google Maps, so I took the position of navigator on our excursion.  

Everything was fine until we needed to navigate highways.  Ordinarily, this would have been no problem with Marlee driving and me reading the directions, but the root of our highway problems was the sun.  Stupid sun... it was in the process of going down, so even the visors couldn't hide it.  We were driving straight towards the sun with nothing to keep the light at bay, so we were driving half-blind.  We knew which highway we were looking for, but spotting it was a different thing altogether.  We were looking for Highway 5 I believe.  Our conversation sounded a little bit like this:

M: We're looking for 5, right?

J: Yeah, that's right.  

M: That's it right there!

J: No, no, that's definitely 55.

M: Wait, are you absolutely sure?

J: Positive!

M: We're looking for a 5...

Yeah, turns out that that particular highway in question was the one we were supposed to take.  My bad... so we were going in the wrong direction, but we didn't figure that out for a few more minutes.  We were forced to take an exit because of a crazy driver, but that crazy driver must have been the hands of Fate, because we were back in familiar territory again.  We were heading in the direction of my permanent address and Marlee's as well.  So we were back on track.

After our driving adventures, we finally made it to the play!  We parked the car and walked up to the building so that we could go in-- we were only about thirty minutes late, which in the scheme of things wasn't so bad considering our many gaffs.  Here was our next problem: The door was locked.  We had both been to plays before, and usually the doors are kept unlocked so that people who were coming could slip in to the back.  Even in an intimate setting.  They would just stand up until intermission and then go find an available seat.  But the entire school was locked in this case.  There was a cleaning lady by the door, so Marlee and I waved our hands wildly trying to get her attention.  When we finally did get her attention, she told us that it was against the rules for her to let us in.  Luckily, she was super nice and went to find someone who could.

Some people who were in the play, but not at the present moment, came to the door and said that they still couldn't let us in.  They explained that the play was already a quarter of the way through and there really wasn't much of a point in staying.  Plus, they didn't have the lock box to give us tickets.  I told them that I didn't care if I had missed a quarter of the play already and that we were still willing to pay to get in because I had promised Ezra that I'd come.  I might have tried to come the next night to see the whole thing, but the night in question was the last night Much Ado was being performed.  They told us that we could still come and see the show, but we'd have to get in after intermission.  Which meant we couldn't come in the building.  They didn't want us wandering around...

So we were stuck outside of the school for the next hour.

The part of town we were in seemed like such a secluded area.  There was one straight of road, so we walked up and down the street looking for something to do.  The coffee shops were closed, so that option was out.  We found a baby store and an antique shop.  The antique shop, Marlee and I decided that we needed to come back to some other time (it was also closed).  The baby store had an interesting window with giraffes and this display included a peculiar map.  Almost all of the countries in the world were off in one way or another.  the most striking part of the map for me were the countries France and Europe.  You read that right.  Europe was a country all on its own and France took up the normal space of France all the way down to Italy and over to the Atlantic coast.  That was rather disappointing... I feel sorry for the child of the family who buys that otherwise beautiful painting.

Around 8:30, we headed back to the school, but the doors were still locked.  Determined to get into the play, we waited.  Another lady joined us who had also come late.  Marlee and I discussed the Mayan calendar and superheroes-- this is how friendships are made, seriously-- up until the point where a friend of the other lady waiting with us came out and opened the door for us.  I think the other lady was more bitter about not getting into the play right away than we were.  I mean, we were disappointed that we couldn't just sneak in, make a fool of ourselves a little bit, and enjoy at least three quarters of the show, but at least we could make the most of our situation.

The lady sitting close to us contacted her friend inside, so when intermission came along, the doors were opened and we were able to slip inside, get our tickets, and... well, awkwardly wait for a spot until we figured out that some people who were present during the first half just left.  I was sad that I had missed sixteen of Ezra's nineteen lines, but I was happy that I could at least see the second half.

It was a very off-the-wall performance, complete with squeaky cupcakes and trench coats, but the play itself was quite comical and made for a lovely evening.

Now I just have to go and read the play myself so I know what I missed!

Stay tuned for more college adventures.

Thanks for Reading!

--Jude

College Adventures: Oh, College!

I have had my first full week of class this past week!  Orientation has come and gone-- it was quite helpful.  Now I know about the different resources available to me and just about all of my questions have been answered regarding how and where I could possibly get involved in something besides academics.  There is an activities fair on the twentieth, so I'm for sure going to go to that so that I can join French Club, maybe Social Dance, and who knows what else is out there on campus!

The first few days of college were difficult as I adjusted and tried to make friends.  No matter what happened, my dorm and everything around me just wasn't home.  But after that initial first couple of days, I grew accustomed to the fact that this new dorm was going to be my home for the next year and this campus for the next next four.  I accepted it and was ready to accept the next challenges that come after homesickness.  My orientation group happened to be made up of the people in one of my classes, so that was very helpful.  I've grown to know a good handful of people in that class and while I haven't hung out with all of them, I have hung out with a couple of them and they are delightful people!  So I had a few friends outside of my roommate.  I don't need a giant group to follow me around, just a few people that I can really get to know.

I became pretty self-sufficient, even in just two short weeks.  I know that I need to get certain things done each week (laundry, cleaning the fish aquarium, washing dishes, studying/homework, etc.) and I've been able to motivate myself to take a break every once in a while during studying or between classes and just get a couple of these things done.

This weekend, I came home for a day (my dad's birthday party) and my mom noticed how efficient I've become and how I've changed in other ways.  When I initially got here early Saturday afternoon, she left sheets and a pillow case on my bed so that I'd have a place to stay so that I could make my bed.  She also knew that I needed to do laundry (I brought my big orange laundry bag home... I was honked at while walking the four to six blocks from the bus stop... why was this attractive to those men in the car?).  I was outside talking to the adults most of the night, but every once in a while, I'd slip inside, start a load of laundry, switch from the washer to the dryer, and then made my bed so that when my blanket was done being washed, I could go right to bed.  She was about to head to bed and she said, "Before you shower, maybe you should get your laundry started," to which I responded that I was already completely done.  She came into my room while I was folding my laundry and offered to help me make my bed, but it was already done.

I felt like I kind of put her out a little bit by already having things done when she offered to help, but at the same time, I find it interesting that in such a short space of time, I have already acquired this mindset that my parents aren't there to remind me when to do things, so I have to make sure they get done myself.  My roommate will not say, "Jude, do your homework,"  "Did you study for your psychology exam?  I'd really get on that now... it's next Thursday," "Jude, did you do your laundry?" "Did you brush your teeth and make your bed?" "You're wearing that thing again?" "Did you wash your dishes?"  You know, be a mom. I don't want and don't expect my roommate to be my mom in this dorm situation.  Nor will I be hers, because we're adults now.

My mom was also a little impressed that I'm already thinking about J-Term and what I could possibly do for that month.  I think that I'm going to take philosophy at one of my school's brother schools.  It's considered a general at my school, so that would be one less thing for me to do during the rest of my time here.

My parents have made sure to ask if I can think of anything that I need that I can get while I'm here.  I have a short list now, but the list that I have of things to bring from my room is longer, but luckily, I lot of things on that list are flat or don't take up a lot of space.

The transition was harder than I thought it would be, but not altogether impossible to get through.  I'm doing very well in college.  I have become efficient and even assertive.  I'm having less of a problem talking on the phone with people when I need help (though I still hate talking on the phone... for me, it's very awkward because I can never anticipate when someone is about to talk because I can't see their mouths open in preparation.  I always end up talking over them accidentally and then I feel bad).

I have applied for five or six jobs, so this week, I get the joy of contacting them all and following up (with the exception of one who said that they'd call me sometime this week because she's finally done interviewing!).  Hurray phones...

Perhaps between book reviews (I'm afraid they're going to be a little far and few between) I think I'll post college adventures, since I've had a few and many of them will be ones I'll tell my kids when they head off to college.  They are tales of fear and stupidity, aggravation, and hilarity.

I'll see you next time and thanks for reading!

--Jude