Cathedral of Learning

I decided to go to the University of Pittsburgh because, why not?  I received so much advice--mainly absurd and unsolicited.  You know, like taking mushrooms and going on a vision quest or getting extremely drunk and going online, deciding, accepting.  Which makes me wonder:  is that how other people decide?  Shit.  Is that what I should have done?  As always, the decision was anti-climatic.  This can be surprising for people, but I think it's because I had already made my decision about a week and a half ago and was making sure that it felt right before I admitted it to myself and committed to it.  Jamie and I were looking at a map of the United States, talking about the road trip we would take to get to whichever school I chose.  As I traced one proposed path, it ended in Pittsburgh.  Weird.

I am so excited!  Now it feels really real and I can begin to plan, hope, dream.  So soon, my days of food service will be over!  I will take an incredible cross-country road trip with Jamie!  My life will change in crazy, dramatic, subtle, unexpected ways!  It will be the end, the beginning of so many things.  It already makes me nervous, stresses me but it's time.

Plus, the Cathedral of Learning!  Ding!

Bellingham Complicates the Situation

Jamie and I went to Bellingham this weekend and I feel more confused about my looming decision.  I keep telling myself to STFU and decide already but I can't!  We stopped at Tulip Town outside of Mount Vernon for the annual Tulip Festival.  I needed to check this off my "Things to do in Washington before I leave" list.  It was a typical spring day, with unpredictable and blustery weather.  We left after I finished working on Saturday, so we passed most of the crowds as they were leaving and we were entering.  The rain left and the sun came, lighting the sky in that surreal way as though after a storm with a faint rainbow.  The tulips were beautiful, of so many shapes, sizes, colors.

We continued on to Bellingham, where we stayed in a (too) expensive, (too) tacky hotel by the freeway.  I agonized over where to eat and decided on Boundary Bay, if only for the beer sampler.  Yes, the ESB is still my favorite.  The next day--an obscenely gorgeous spring day--we went to the Mount Bakery (vegetarian Eggs Benedict!) and walked around Western.  I had to show Jamie the legendary MHB statue, the fountain where I skinny-dipped after graduation, my favorite study place in the library.  We walked down to Boulevard Park from Fairhaven, lounging in the grass like days of old, watching the undergraduates engage in adorable flirtation and frisbee dates.  We dined at Flats, an excellent tapas bar in Fairhaven that lived up to my memories of the place.

Now for the confusion: I love Bellingham!  I don't want to live there now, but spending time there again reminded me of so many things that I did enjoy about the nature of the town, and many of the things that are lacking in Seattle.  Yes, I did remember some of the things that I didn't like--the incestuous nature of the place (I only saw six people I recognized on this trip), twenty-one-year-olds running around everywhere on Saturday night.  It made me confused about Ann Arbor, which is larger than Bellingham but is probably similar.  This was the largest hesitation toward the University of Michigan.  But on Sunday, sitting in the sun outside the Firehouse Cafe, I wanted it again.  As I've said before, with every day comes a different idea of what I want.

Now For a Coin Toss

I mailed forms declining admission to Indiana, Simmons, and Rutgers this weekend.  I panicked slightly as I pushed them into the outgoing mail slot--am I narrowing my future?  (Well, yes, but I have to choose just one.)   Remaining: University of Pittsburgh and University of Michigan.  The deadline for Pittsburgh has been extended to April 30, giving me more time to not think about it.  I have had two phone interviews for internships in Pittsburgh and should hear back by the end of the week--hopefully making my decision easier.

I am tired of receiving advice from people who know nothing about me, or the programs, cities, or all of the above.  I feel conflicted: after a recent conversation with an LIS professor at the University of Washington about the two schools, I was certain (for about twenty minutes) that I should go to the University of Michigan.  Apparently, in the elite world of library science academia, Michigan is more prestigious.  Whenever I mention that it is one of my final contenders, people seem very impressed.  And I like it.  Until I remember that I don't really care about prestige.  I went to Western (anyone who went to WWU and has friends who went to UW understands) and loved it.

My future is starting to freak me out again.  Maybe it's just the decision that still must be made.  Or the huge change that comes with the decision.  When I started this process last summer, I started dreaming about the grand trip I would take before I started school.  Ideas of Russia, Argentina, Japan, or anywhere.  This isn't going to happen, which is realistic and sensible (money, money, money).  The plan is for a great American roadtrip to the school of choice.  Which is good.  But the epic trip seems so far away.

Names in a Hat

Now to decide.  It's really always the most difficult part: the decision.  Decisions with deadlines.  As it stands, I am choosing between the University of Michigan, University of Pittsburgh, Indiana University, and Simmons College.  I'm leaning away from Indiana University because Bloomington does not seem as interesting/exciting as Ann Arbor, Pittsburgh, or Boston.  The acceptance deadline for both Simmons and Pittsburgh is April 15, before I will be able to visit any of the schools.  Partially, it doesn't matter because all of the programs are good.  But I will be spending two years there (or more) and I want it to be incredible.  But any of the four would be new, different from anything I've ever experienced.  But cornfields or the Great Lakes?  Allegheny National Forest or the Atlantic coast?  It doesn't matter, maybe, because no choice is a bad choice.

What to do, what to do.  This determines my future for the next few years.  Better make it good.  But it's close, nearly tangible.  When I make a decision, it will make it real.  I will be leaving in the fall, going back to school so that I never have to work a minimum wage service job again.  Anything, everything about this is an adventure.  I'm agonizing over the decision, yeah, but it'll be fine.  It's exciting.

Amy and Jamie and Food (blog)

The food blog has just begun.  It will be a collaborative effort between Jamie and myself involving food, cooking, photography, experimentation, failure.  After several months of development (read: brief conversations about starting the blog), we started the blog several days after our self-imposed deadline.  Please read!

In other personal news: I have been accepted into the MLIS program at Indiana University.  Which means (dunh dunh dunh) that I have a place to go in the fall!  I knew it was coming, but there is now an end in sight.  Although this one is still often obscured by the too-bright February sun (spring in winter!) or the foam of one too many lattes, there is an end.  It only follows that I will also be accepted elsewhere.  Even if not, I like the program at IU and will enthusiastically move to Bloomington in August. 

I will also be leaving my wonderful, temporary, frigid basement/dungeon room of the last ten months and cohabiting with Jamie soon.  We've sewn curtains.  Watch out.

The First Application

One down...  After an absurdly stressful week (in typical finals-week style panic) I submitted my first graduate school application!  I can't count how many times I decided that I didn't actually want to go to graduate school because it would be much simpler to stop where I was than figure how to sidestep the obstacle.  It will be much easier from here, I hope.  I've learned so much, and this momentum should sustain itself.

Interesting lessons revealed thus far:

1. Simply because someone agrees to write a letter of recommendation--with very advanced notice--does not mean that said person will write said letter.

2. I should have at least one extra person who is willing to write a letter of recommendation.  Just in case.  Two or more is better.

3. The people at the admissions office DO NOT CARE that the person writing the letter of recommendation might not follow through.

4. The people at the admissions office DO NOT CARE about you or me or your application or mine.

5. Although the due date may be stated as December 15th (implying that the applicant has until midnight), the due date is actually 4:30 pm central time on the 15th, or 2:30 my time (it may also be necessary to look up time zones).

6. Writing a personal statement is difficult, and people who say they whipped it up and sent it out are lying or wrote terrible papers.

7. This process is expensive: between $50 and $100 per application with transcripts and GRE scores. Robbery.

8.  Do I really want to go to graduate school?  Sure, why not.

9.  Each application is different, especially regarding the scholarship instructions, so it is necessary to strenuously wade through each.

It's just another set of hoops through which I must hop, skip, and jump.  I'm getting better at it.

Hoops and hurdles

I am over, done, finished, through with that test. I did well, and more importantly, well enough to be satisfied with the results and not feel the need to take it again. So, I've successfully squirmed through another hoop. Now what? This was the biggest hurdle for so long that I put almost no thought into what came after. I'm trying to simply bask in the glory of the moment but my mind leaps ahead. [Better indulge it for a moment] Grad school: yes. In what? Library and Information Science: this seems good. But what if I want to do something else? There are so many possibilities and I almost felt as if I could never achieve any of them because I wouldn't pass the GRE. [Asinine] So, here I am. Another crossroads: decisions, decisions! The application process is daunting; the decision-making process, even more so.

I felt calm entering the test. I knew I would do well, I knew it would be relatively easy to achieve what I needed. So then what? Perhaps I harbored the minutest sliver of hope that I wouldn't do well and could use that as an excuse to not. Postpone the choices. But here I am now. Looking forward.