Even My Whims Are Carefully Planned
Oct. 11th, 2005 12:44 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bloodyrosemccoyBehold! I have fixed the internet! I was having trouble signing in, but ResNet talked me through it, and it was easy. Thank the gods something decided not to get complicated.
Today I talked with an adviser about going to Kenya for the fall next year. She gave me an outline of what I’d be facing, and also told me to check with Mom’n’Dad on the exact nature of the WUE scholarship, to see if I can apply it to a Study Abroad program. That’d be a load off my mind if I could.
It’s starting to actually seem feasible.* I was always one of those people who was awed by the ability of others to go out and do stuff. Travel always seems so difficult to me. Mostly I’ve gone to places nearby, although granted I do those right. Moab and by extension the entire American Southwest has claimed a piece of my heart to the point that chocolate with chili powder sounds like a magnificent gourmet experience, instead of something dreamed up by crazy people. Wyoming also holds me in its grip; the mountainous crispness and serenely rich color in Jackson Hole and the biting, bubbling steam and dense forests of Yellowstone have been lately haunting my thoughts. But anywhere beyond about two states over is shockingly far.
However! I aim to change all that. I want my life to be interesting, and I want to experience things and not let my obsessive-compulsive recluse tendencies get in the way. So I find myself planning this trip, and it’s not as impossible as I would have expected.
Of course, there are logistics. Barring the big one of money, there will be the questions of whether I can handle the week of rural life, how I’ll adapt to a whole term away from home, what I’ll study, if I’ll be able to pick up Swahili, and—rather an important consideration—what I’ll do about da happy pills. I suppose I could just suck it up and wobble about like Captain Jack Sparrow, only sweatier, for a few days, but traveling is a time of great stress. I’d really want an emergency backup supply of Effexor in case my prank-loving brain decided to take the quantum change in my life as a cue for a relapse. But I’m pretty sure I could work something out. And as for the language, I pick things up fast; I’ve already managed to teach myself a bit out of books. It’s great fun to be able to turn to one of the guys from Home Depot and say, quite casually, “Habari za mchana?” and have him turn back and regard me with the same expression you’d adopt if an orangutan who a moment ago had been scratching his armpit suddenly came out with,“I say, old chap, what is the news this afternoon?” Even so, that’s about all I can say. I’d really like to be able to tell people that I’m fairly fluent in it, not just sorta dabbling, so I’d try my darndest.
The next question is how this will interfere with my running away to sea. Given the Lady’s schedule, it would be a tight crunch if I were to do that next year, too. I may wind up being a sailor some other year, instead, and have to send Aspen or Heather along as scouts to tell me how it was.
I guess it all depends on the money. Let’s see if my plans can come all the way to fruition.
In other news, Liz and I caved in and ordered the Harry Potter wands because, when you strip away the superficial exterior of intellectualism, we are silly people.
*Meaning, of course, that it can be feased.
Today I talked with an adviser about going to Kenya for the fall next year. She gave me an outline of what I’d be facing, and also told me to check with Mom’n’Dad on the exact nature of the WUE scholarship, to see if I can apply it to a Study Abroad program. That’d be a load off my mind if I could.
It’s starting to actually seem feasible.* I was always one of those people who was awed by the ability of others to go out and do stuff. Travel always seems so difficult to me. Mostly I’ve gone to places nearby, although granted I do those right. Moab and by extension the entire American Southwest has claimed a piece of my heart to the point that chocolate with chili powder sounds like a magnificent gourmet experience, instead of something dreamed up by crazy people. Wyoming also holds me in its grip; the mountainous crispness and serenely rich color in Jackson Hole and the biting, bubbling steam and dense forests of Yellowstone have been lately haunting my thoughts. But anywhere beyond about two states over is shockingly far.
However! I aim to change all that. I want my life to be interesting, and I want to experience things and not let my obsessive-compulsive recluse tendencies get in the way. So I find myself planning this trip, and it’s not as impossible as I would have expected.
Of course, there are logistics. Barring the big one of money, there will be the questions of whether I can handle the week of rural life, how I’ll adapt to a whole term away from home, what I’ll study, if I’ll be able to pick up Swahili, and—rather an important consideration—what I’ll do about da happy pills. I suppose I could just suck it up and wobble about like Captain Jack Sparrow, only sweatier, for a few days, but traveling is a time of great stress. I’d really want an emergency backup supply of Effexor in case my prank-loving brain decided to take the quantum change in my life as a cue for a relapse. But I’m pretty sure I could work something out. And as for the language, I pick things up fast; I’ve already managed to teach myself a bit out of books. It’s great fun to be able to turn to one of the guys from Home Depot and say, quite casually, “Habari za mchana?” and have him turn back and regard me with the same expression you’d adopt if an orangutan who a moment ago had been scratching his armpit suddenly came out with,“I say, old chap, what is the news this afternoon?” Even so, that’s about all I can say. I’d really like to be able to tell people that I’m fairly fluent in it, not just sorta dabbling, so I’d try my darndest.
The next question is how this will interfere with my running away to sea. Given the Lady’s schedule, it would be a tight crunch if I were to do that next year, too. I may wind up being a sailor some other year, instead, and have to send Aspen or Heather along as scouts to tell me how it was.
I guess it all depends on the money. Let’s see if my plans can come all the way to fruition.
In other news, Liz and I caved in and ordered the Harry Potter wands because, when you strip away the superficial exterior of intellectualism, we are silly people.
*Meaning, of course, that it can be feased.
