stay....here??

Each time i talk to kristin, she tells me how great it would be if i just stayed here in st. louis. and every time, i say, no! i don't want to move back to st. louis. but here I am, 3 days at home, and thinking...maybe... maybe i could live here. i like it right now. i think about moving back to new york, and there's so much anxiety in that. do i want to do that? i'm not sure. staying here would be easier. i know i could find a job. i could think about going back to school. i could get ready to go on trips and adventures abroad.
and then i think, what are you doing? i was never going to stay here! i was never going to come back here. but then, i don't hate it like i used to. there's a lot of great things in this city, maybe it'd be ok to live here for a little while? til i get tired of hiding and want to bust out on my own again?
we'll see. but i don't hate the idea.

in a year's time

So much can happen in a year's time. And so much has happened! My Americorps adventure is over now. I talked to Addie and Jenn last night. Sweet Addie called me to see how home was and tell me she missed me. I do miss my team.
I know that the 2 breaks i had during americorps, i didn't hesitate to blow off any connection i may have had with my teammates, and sort of happiness i had in this program. i was just happy to be home, with my friends and family. But now that it's really over, and the people i lived and worked with so closely for the last 8 months might easily end up among the ranks of those close friends that fall by the wayside as life moves on, i find myself feeling much more attached to those people. They were my friends and my family and my coworkers and my teammates. I trust that there are at least 3 among their ranks that i will see again. And another 3 or 4 i'd very much like to see again. I can say with confidence that i will now have a place to crash in each corner of the country.

I remember a couple years ago, expressing a sentiment of wondering. I commented that the people i know now have made such an impact on my life, and how many people i will meet that i don't yet know who will have an even greater impact on me.

And how many there have been!
I'm excited to move on. I don't feel trapped into a path whose direction i don't like anymore. I feel once again like i have the freedom to go anywhere and do anything. But unlike before, it doesn't feel like a burden anymore, it simply feels like the freedom it is. I'm so lucky! I'm nearly 24, with a college degree, energy, and experience and a desire to experience life to the fullest. How many places i can go with that!!

So yes, i'm glad that Americorps is over, at least for me. There may be consequences later on for this decision, but I can say with a lot of confidence, this was the right decision for me right now.

a lot has happened

So it's been 3 weeks since i updated. and it's probably an understatement to say a lot has happened in that time.
The short version is this:
I quit Americorps, and i'm back home in st. louis. I am going back to camp this summer. my camp in new york.
i'll explain more later. now i'm going to go buy tickets to tonight's cards game.

another weekend gone

Look at me updating my blog regularly!
It's monday, i'm back at school. yesterday and this morning, about half the members of my team said at one point or another, 'i don't want to go to school today...'
but here we are.
it was a great weekend. we spent saturday at jazz fest, saw the roots and diana krall and this fun zydeco band after my shift of tshirt selling. I had originally wanted to stay and see jazz fest sunday as well, especially after a friend offered me a free ticket. but my team wasn't staying, and by the end of the day saturday, i was glad to be going back to biloxi for a day of relaxing.
yesterday was definitely relaxing! we spent the whole day at the beach, reading, playing, and hanging out.
hopefully sometime this week we'll find out our next project. only 3 weeks of school left!