Never more will trouble us.

I got an email today from an old professor of mine, Konstantin Dierks. He teaches in the history department and I took a beginning U.S. history course with him last year. We have since kept in touch and he has added me to what he calls his "A-Team." It's a group of several past students who have stood out as being "interesting and strange," as he put it. Or something. My placement on this email list was finalized after lunch this past fall. We met at Chow Bar on Indiana and talked about culture, Italy, film, music, my plans for the future, etc. He has written letters of recommendation for me in the past and kindly corresponds when he has time. Well, he has a newborn so we haven't been in touch often. Finally I got this email today and was delighted to hear from him. Amazing how contact with other people can be so fantastically uplifting.

I checked out the other students on the email list. Michael Sanserino is one of them. I laughed. Sanserino is the editor in chief of the Indiana Daily Student newspaper here on campus. We worked together last semester. He landed a summer internship with the Wall Street Journal. I feel happy to be on the same email list as him. I feel happy to know we both have intellectual curiousity.

More later, I suppose. Just a short update.

It is finally spring here in Bloomington. The trees are so lovely. Life is springing from every branch, and the sticky little flowers are opening to the sunshine. The smell the blooming trees release is almost intoxicating. It's thick and sweet and warm. I am delighted and content.

I wish I may

If I could go back and do it all differently, here's what I would change.

I'd have been more involved in non-profit groups. I'd have liked to work with Big Brothers/Sisters or the Boys and Girls Club. It would have been nice to have worked at a summer camp. It looks good on a resume if you have a few years of charity work or community work, and I'm sure it gives one a sense of satisfaction or fulfillment.

I'd have taken classes that focused on new media. I took a few of those, but really, most of my classes were about news writing and now I'm graduating with little knowledge about the web and multimedia. I would have taken a course on radio broadcasting, or something like that, too.

I would have gotten an internship sooner. I feel like I put it off. My first really valuable internship is at the HT, and I'm currently a senior. I could have gotten some summer internships sophomore and senior year, and I'd be ahead of the game.

That said, here's what I would never give up, and I'm proud to say I've done:
I wrote for three years for the school paper.
I spent a semester abroad.
I learned how to work in a restaurant and met some great people in the process.
I have a solid group of friends and some of the best memories.
I wrote for a small, local publication about the environment.
I learned to live alone and love it.

Culmination.

I've spent the last week letting go of everything I know to be comfortable. I can feel it slipping from me and no matter how far I strain my neck to see what is behind me, I cannot turn around. There is a wall being built between then and now and I am on the other side of it with no idea of what lies ahead of me and nothing to keep me going that way but a sense that I must. That's how I describe my most recent actions. I am driven by a deep knowing that sits inside me and guides me, despite my protest. Consciously, I hate what I'm doing. I hate that I'm leaving the past three years of my life behind me and moving on to something I can't define. I hate the panic that ensues when I think about what's really happening to me. Did I honestly make this decision? What has come over me?

I remember Elizabeth Gilbert saying that at least once in your life, you will do something or make something that is not yours, and you will come out of it wondering who took the wheel, because it certainly wasn't you. That's how I feel. I feel like I'm along for the ride, and my soul is a reckless driver. I'm gripping the "oh shit handles" and screaming like hell in protest, but I can't get out of the car. I have to go. The horizon is visible, though I don't know what's on it. I think that's the most terrifying part of it all...the not knowing.

Yesterday I drove out to Lake Monroe just to sit on the water's edge and listen. I was so close to nature and I felt it wrap me up and rock me like a mother does her child. I sat and I watched the moon rise over the lake as the birds soared above me. I could hear the feathers of their wings rustle as they flew, their calls echoed across the rippling water.

I was so at peace, I was afraid to leave.

But I did. I went to Bloomingfoods and picked up fresh groceries - pasta and tomatoes and fresh basil and garlic. Some bread and brie. Coffee and strawberries for the morning.
I came home and cleaned the house with the windows and both doors open and the music on. It was about 65 degrees and I felt fantastic.

But the pasta still sits in the pan, unwrapped and waiting. The fresh basil has wilted. The bread is stale. I settled for toaster waffles. And now I'm drinking cheap wine and avoiding my homework.

Nothing, really. And that's the best part.

They left you alone
She's cheap.
What am I doing all the way over here?
Swoosh. Coffee. Brew. Drip Dribble Drip.
DING! Wake up!
Clang! Silverware bang, southern slang and a telephone rang.
Thought I was hungry.
Ordered a Smörgåsbord
Turns out I wasn't.
Took two bites, left it cold.
Broken egg yolks, sticky and smeared.
I turn a new page and its plainness beckons me.
I am free again.





I want to go swimming in new words.
I'd let them flow over my skin
and describe me eloquently.
I would eat them, gobble them up and
spit them out later
when they were called for,
when their pronunciation would be most satisfying,
and saying them produced wild afterthoughts
that's about all I am lately.
Lots and lots of afterthoughts.