Dear friends,
Hello. How have you been? It's been... two months-ish. That's the appropriate amount of time, right? I feel like I haven't talked to many people in a long time. This is probably the hard part of adulthood, though, where all your friends move on to the exciting and important things in their lives, and they (and you) are just so excited about what's going on that it's hard to remember that there are other people that are important and who have forgotten about you just as much as you've forgotten about them. But the important thing, I think, is that we can acknowledge that we are all very busy, and that sometimes, we just need to focus on our immediate lives, and other people will come back and we can catch up when we have time, and just because you don't talk as much as you used to doesn't mean you're completely not even friends anymore. That's a ridiculous notion that sometimes seems too true.
Anyway, here is my attempt to catch you up on things that have been going on. It is, as always, also my attempt to avoid doing homework.
Life is good. Life is busy. That's how it's supposed to be though. I'm working on filling out things for study abroad, which is quickly--occasionally too quickly--approaching. I have some friends who are studying abroad right now, and whenever I hear or read about their adventures, I feel like my turn can't come soon enough. But also, there are times, mostly during the night-times when things are darker and scarier and more ominous, when I feel like I've made the worst decision of my life. Like, I don't actually want to be a Spanish major. I'm probably going to die when I have to leave this place that I've lived in relative safety for my entire life. I will know no one and my life will be completely changed and death is knocking on my door. But that's probably just anxiety talking.
So, yeah, study abroad stuff is on my mind a lot right now. In good news, I just found out I was awarded another study abroad scholarship, which is super cool! And also, the price of my trip was reduced, so that's also cool. Now, my entire program cost is covered by my financial aid, which includes several generous scholarships, without which this entire adventure would probably not be possible. I'm starting to get worried about buying stuff and paying for other things while I'm actually in Argentina, but I still have at least a few months before that becomes more urgent. But any study abroad friends who have advice about money and buying things in foreign countries, that would be super cool!
In actual school news, classes are good. Sometimes I wonder about the relevance of my learning, but it's fine. It's weird when you go to a liberal arts college, sometimes, because things will connect in weird ways, or it even seems like things have no value to the rest of your education, but you learn them anyway because more knowledge is better, right?
Also, do you ever wonder why professors pick certain things for you to read? For example, because of a book we're reading right now, I currently know a suspicious amount of information about sugarcane plantations and workers in a specific region in Brazil in the 1960s, but what am I going to do with this information in the rest of my life???
Also, I'm taking an English class, and it's great, but I'm not even an English major. I just took it because I could, and because it's interesting to me. But how will this help me with the rest of my life? I mean, it probably will, but sometimes the subtleties of liberal arts frustrate me.
On the other hand, I only have 9 more days of class before the semester's over, which is vaguely terrifying. Because of the fact that I only have class Tuesdays and Thursdays, my schedule is very strange, and leads to me thinking that Christmas is literally right around the corner, but actually I will still be here for like 6 more weeks. I'm trying not to rush it; I want to enjoy the last times I'll have here for a while, but thinking about it in terms of only 9 days of class makes everything seem a lot faster and SCARIER.
I'm all about scarier. Probably.
Good luck with the last few months of the year, my friends. Soon it will be 2017, and everyone will feel so old. 17 is just an old looking number, so that's why they'll feel older in two months than they do now. Trust me. It's a scientific fact.
