the right path

Well, I finally feel like I'm on the right path again. Whatever that means. My path seems to have a lot more twists and turns in it than everybody else's.

But that's ok. The idea of monotony really scares me. More than striking out and flying to Korea by myself. Which is what I'm doing!

I'm still apprehensive about a few things like bank accounts, layovers, getting on the right bus, finding the grocery store (I worry about really specific things, haha), etc., I feel MUCH more at ease than I did a month ago. I guess feeling secure in your decision does that to you.

I also definitely feel like everything will be ok from here on out. Not that there won't be hard times in the future of course, but that I'm better equipped to deal with them. And hopefully I've made enough mistakes to know what not to do in the grand scheme of things (as in not set myself up for a bad situation later, i.e. moving back in with my parents AGAIN). I have some ideas for what I want to do at the end of my year contract, but none of them are set in stone, and there's no reason for me to really be worried about that right now, except for taking minor preparatory steps. There are a couple of things I am sure about:
1.) making the most of my time in Korea while saving maximum $
2.)I want a Master's degree
3.)This will probably not be the last time I go to work overseas

Anyway, that said, I'm done speculating for now. It's time to get on that plane and go with the flow.

The past couple of weeks have definitely been interesting. The week before last, the highlight of course was my birthday, but other than that, it was terrible. Total ennui. Ugh. So, since I was going to have to go anyway to get my visa, I decided to head down to Houston to see Katie and get a change of scenery. So, my weekend with Katie was fun, and then I headed to Gagi's.

I feel like I got myself back to a healthier place mentally and physically, plus I got my visa. When I was at the Consulate I realized by talking to the other Americans there how much you instantly bond with other people doing stuff like this. It gave me back that sense of belonging I've been missing since I left Prague.

Then, today, I got most of my packing done (which was quite the task), and I went to visit my Uncle Dennis and Aunt Susan (I don't know why I put the labels; I never use them. I think it's because I was the only grandchild for so long that I felt weird being the only one calling them aunt and uncle) in Dallas. It was great to see them and the kids, and it was nice having intelligent conversation with people who've had similar experiences to what I'm about to have. Again, that bond like what I felt at the Consulate was there. Susan gave me a cookbook designed for people living overseas (you can't get the same grocery items there), and I'm really excited about that too.

So, ready as I am to get going, leaving is kind of bittersweet. It's sad to leave my friends and family--I already miss them. But I know that I'm doing the right thing for me right now, and I know this experience is going to be phenomenal. This time, it's not leaving and planning to come back in a year to the same place and do the same thing. It's embarking on the rest of my life, filled with unknowns and the motivation to keep moving forward, welcoming new stages instead of running scared.

falling apart

I am so angry with myself. Why am I here again? AGAIN????

Everything wasn't supposed to fall apart. I was supposed to be getting a handle on things, finding myself or whatever. I feel like I've been on the verge of hyperventilating all day. I am so disappointed at how everything has turned out. It's taken me four months to admit that to myself. Prague wasn't supposed to be something I felt sad about. It was supposed to be this wonderful, challenging experience, and it was, but it was supposed to still be going on.

I feel empty, stupid, weak, and cheated. I want to go back more than anything. I feel like I BELONG there. I do belong there. And I was an idiot to leave so suddenly, without thinking it through. I was scared. And that's what it all boils down to. I'm a coward. What have I done? and why do I always do this? I run scared and then I want to come running back. Except to grad school. I don't really want to go back there even though I miss it sometimes. But seriously, how could I do something of this magnitude? This is my life. I can't keep just farting along, not doing anything.

I guess I really need to grieve. Or return. Grieve if I can't return. I had been looking forward to Prague for so long before I went and then it ended so abruptly, and here I am again at rock bottom only it's lower than it was before, that this really was a big loss. And I'm just now admitting this to myself.

Whatever. I need to go to bed.

half empty, half full

Negative thoughts I need to flush out of my system (because I am a positive person, damnit!):

• feeling fat
• the lack of close friends in this stupid town
  
• mourning the loss of my international travel plans/life in Prague
  
• trying to figure out how to balance my social life and being healthy/training
• the fear/dread of what the hell am I going to do if I don't have a job by August
  
• coming to terms with the possibility of staying in this area
  

Positive things I have going for me right now to counteract the above:

• I'm having a blast at Seals this summer...something I haven't had for a long time
• I'm working really hard at being healthy, learning a lot about nutrition, and loving it
• when all is said and done, I really do want to be a teacher
  
• moving out of my parents' house is on the horizon! 11 months is too long!
• going to grad school for a year was the best decision I'd ever made, and dropping out of it was an even better one...that doesn't really go with this list, but just a thought
  
• I literally have friends all over the world.
  

my tearful goodbye to the CZ

I need to stop assuming that I don't deserve friends, or for people to really like me.

Tonight, I had my Prague goodbye dinner/evening. First was dinner at this AWESOME pizzeria we (well, Emma) discovered in Wenceslas Square. It was delicious, and the company was even better. It was just the girls for dinner: me, Olivia, Cara, Emma, Sarah, Amanda, and Renee. I had a great time.

Then, I get a call from Nick and a text message from Mike, and they want to see me before I leave. So, after dinner, we went to U Sedu (commonly referred to as "the cave bar") for a drink. I told the guys where we were going, and they came to meet us. I don't know why I was so surprised by that.

Mike, Nick, Kenny, Pat, and Jeff come strolling in. We hung out for a little bit. They all hugged me, said how much they were going to miss me (and I said the same to them, of course), and how glad they were that they got to see me before I left.

I just couldn't believe they all came out to see me. Like I said, I don't know why that surprised me.

Stuff like that has always surprised me. It's like I don't actually think that I'm worthy of being liked or for people to give a damn about me. But I think if I believe it, it will be even more true.

I'm slowly learning to let my guard down. I hope that education continues.

I'm going to miss everyone I've met here so much. I've been (and I still am) so, so excited about my new journey--going home, then going to South Korea. But tonight, I feel the pain of leaving Prague. I've had an absolutely amazing time here, and I've learned so much, and grown so much stronger, but it's so much deeper than that. I can't really express it in words--and I can always express things in words.

I'm just going to miss my Prague family. I think I will always feel close to them, no matter the physical distance. And it's ok for me to feel sad about that right now.

okay...with perspective

Doing things for yourself is amazing.

Not taking anyone else into consideration for your actions and just doing what you want to do... it's so simple. I'm not saying you shouldn't do things for other people. I'm just saying that when making big life decisions, it's best to look out for #1 only.

My parents were really surprised that I'm so ok with the recent turn of events. I just kind of shrugged and said, "What's not to be ok with?"

That one, seemingly simple question says so much more. It is the embodiment of how far I've come.

I think what mainly surprised my parents was that when things aren't going the way I've planned, or I'm going through a major change (whether or not it's brought about by my own choice), I tend to freak out. I get very unstable and existential.

I have, of course, gone through some of the self-destructive habits of the unemployed. Particularly the unemployed in Europe (when in Prague...).

But I'm totally, 112% ok. Happy, even. And I know that I always can be--I have the power to be. Again, what's not to be ok with? Ever. I'm finally learning to roll with it. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

On another note, distance can also do wonders for a person.

This weekend, my former grad school counterparts took their comprehensive exams. I kept reading their facebook statuses about how they were freaking out, hated their lives, felt like masochists, etc., etc. But all I could think about was how accomplished they were going to feel at the end of the weekend. And how I wasn't there pouring out sweat, blood, and tears with them. How I wasn't going to (yet) know that sense of accomplishment.

It's fine. I know that I made the right decision for me. I also know that I made it a lot harder on myself. But hey, that's what I do. What I mean is that because I've decided to go back in a year and finish my Master's, it's going to be harder for me because I broke up that continuous stream of knowledge and will haven taken 2 years off between my first and second year. That's going to be a lot harder, both in terms of comps and regular coursework. Also, my cohort that I began the program will (obviously) have all moved on by the time I go back. I will be with a bunch of people that I don't know, who didn't know the program the way I did in 2007-2008. And of course, I won't have my grad school buddy, Chelsie. No one could ever replace her. But I know she's doing it without me right now, so I know I can do it without her too.

The flip side of all of those things is that I have So. Much. More. Perspective now. That's what I meant about distance doing amazing things. Last summer, I was so bogged down in the program and not feeling a purpose and drowning in piles of projects that I knew I could handle but didn't have the motivation to. After being away for almost 10 months and doing a LOT of soul searching, I know that a Master's in rhet/comp is really what I want. And I want to finish it in Corpus Christi. I had to be away to get it, to appreciate it, and to remember what I love.

Also, it could also be a good thing that I won't be finishing the program with the people I started it with. It might be good for me to have some classes with people I haven't been in class with since undergrad. Get some new insights--the TEFL course was definitely like that, and I needed it. Also, I won't already be jaded about these people before the classes even start. The whole thing will be more separate from my undergrad, and that can only be positive.

Sidenote: I helped a friend with some writing recently. I felt rusty, but I've still got it! It felt nice to know that I can still do that stuff.

God, it will be weird to move to Corpus Christi and not know anyone there!

Ok, I'm done talking about this for now. My next post should be much more interesting ;).

stronger

So here I am again, about to break another lease.

This time, it's not really an "I should've known better and thought about this beforehand" type thing. I couldn't have predicted my reasons for leaving. They are real and practical and do not have anything to do with whims. Do I feel relieved? Yes. Am I justified in feeling that way, or is it my continual urge to run away? I don't know.

I guess that doesn't really matter. All that matters is what is. I'm really excited to go to Asia, though. Maybe more excited than I was to come to Prague. That could be because this will be more like starting a life, because I'll arrive with a job. And because I won't be as scared of relocating halfway around the world this time. I think.

I'm also excited to go home for a little bit. I've really missed Texas. My friends, my family, the sky, the open spaces, Mexican food, driving (I hate to admit that!), warm weather, etc., etc. It will be totally weird to hear people speaking English all the time. As much as I've loved the past 2 months, this experience has given me a new appreciation for home. I finally understand that...although for me (and a few others like me, I think), I had to go see the world to feel that way. And I will always want to continue traveling.

Part of me is tempted to stay home, but I'm not done traveling yet. I've got the rest of my life to stay home. Plus, now I know that I definitely want to move back to Texas when I'm done teaching overseas. That's where I ultimately belong, no matter how many rednecks tell me I'm too liberal for it. Texas is made up of all kinds, not just rednecks and cowboys (not that there's anything wrong with cowboys).

I'm so ready for Friday to get here, yet I never want it to come.

I am so much stronger now than I ever thought I could be.

Jewish Quarter

Today, I was really pissed off because the person who was supposed to go sightseeing with me bailed like 2 minutes before we were supposed to meet. If she had told me earlier, I would not have been on the tram I was on going the direction I was going. Oh, well.

So. I decided that since it was a reasonably nice day and not too cold (I am not currently wearing my coat because of the vomit stains), I would go see something cool by myself. I was close to the green line, so I hopped on the metro and got off in the Jewish Quarter, which is something I'd been wanting to revisit since our walking tour six weeks ago.

I found what I was looking for pretty easily. An area with lots of synagogues, a great view of the castle by the way, and I just walked toward this huge wall with lots of tombstones behind it. I figured that must be the Jewish cemetery and museum, based on how it was described to me.

I was able to use my outdated college I.D. to get a discount on the entry fee. I went into the museum, which when you first walk in is two floors of just these walls with all of the Czech Holocause victims' names and birth/death dates written in red and black EVERYWHERE. It's really overwhelming. There's nothing else in this part of the museum. Photography in there is forbidden, which I totally agree with. It would be very disrespectful to make these people's memorial into some cheap tourist landmark. So being in these rooms was just completely humbling and powerful. It almost made me want to cry. Especially since I saw the movie The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas pretty soon before I came here.

You always hear about the Holocaust as this event that you know really happened and was a really big deal. But learning about it in history classes and such kind of makes the people involved seem like fictional characters. When you see all those names written in tiny writing covering the walls of several rooms, it hits you how big of a deal it really was. And these rooms were just the people from one country. Multiply that by the rest of the people in Europe who were affected. Wow.

And it gets even more powerful. There's another room in the museum where they have children's drawings from WWII--Jewish children, who went to ghettos and concentration camps, some of whom survived, and some of whom didn't. They are child-like drawings of the trains, the camps, the ghettos, their dreams, and imaginations. There are journal entries, photographs, old star of David patches. But it's mostly the drawings that get you. They are labeled by who drew them, when, and whether or not they survived. Some of them have unknown artists.

I was trying to figure out why this experience affected me so much more than when I went to the Holocaust museum in Houston. I think it's because here, it doesn't seem so far away. All of this stuff happened right here, or very close to here.

Anyway, so when you walk out of the museum, you can go into the Jewish cemetery. I'll post pictures of this part. There are all these freaking OLD tombstones just piled on top of each other in this garden area with old Hebrew writing on them. I wish I could've read what they said. They are covered in moss and weathering away. The museum people are trying to restore them as much as possible. I think I read something that said they restore 100 a year or something like that.

These graves (I think, based on what I could tell from the signs and brochures) are mostly from the 16 and 1700s. Some may be older than that. Damn. I can't quite figure out why the Jewish graves/burials were so neglected back then and for so long (the cemetery and all the refurbishing has only been happening since 1975). I guess it's just the anti-Semitic attitudes that were prevalent in Europe for so long. I guess as an American that's hard for me to understand.