A Thousand Words

(If you don't get the title, look at the title from the last entry)

I have so much on my mind today, and I keep trying to find a place to get rid of it. I suppose that place is my blog. If you get bogged down and don't finish reading, I don't blame you. That may even happen to me. :)

My life is changing quite dramatically in the next couple weeks, and I feel a little freaked out by it. I haven't been in school in more than 3 years (with the exception of one online class). I also am at a point where I love my job. Really love my job. My troublesome coworker is gone, and everyone else is just amazing. I love the patients, I love my boss, I love getting to feel like I'm doing something important. I have four days of work left, about 20 hours, and I honestly feel like crying. I don't want to leave. Isn't that weird? I mean, it's not like it was a career. Some days I hated it. But it's just going so darn well right now.

I have learned something about myself while working here, though. You know how they have those things where you make a list of what's important to you professionally? Like, is it important to make a lot of money or stay in a particular location. Whatever makes you happy about the work you're doing. So here's mine: I have to be doing work that helps other people, and I have to be able to improve upon what I'm doing. If I have those two criteria, I can be happy at my job.

That said, I am super excited about school. I have 18 more days, which doesn't feel like very much. I am nervous to be starting graduate work. In fact, I dreamed last night that my first graduate course was actually a high school level English class, and the kids didn't like me and my teacher was angry to have a graduate student in his class. As I'm doubting that's actually how it's going to go, I will ignore that dream. I am excited to be back among my own kind (that is, the all-I-do-all-day-is-read variety). I'm excited to be accompanying again over in the music department, and I'm excited to be back in the writing center. I really hope I like teaching college, because otherwise this whole going-back-to-school thing is going to work out rather poorly.

Yesterda, I also received yet another rejection from an agent for my book. The first one just about killed me. I moped for days. But now it's fine. My goal is to get 188 rejections. So I only have 183 left to go!

I'm also writing a song! I've never written a song from scratch before. It's not very easy, I've discovered. It is written from the point of view of one of the Roman soldiers who crucified Christ. Steve and I sat down and wrote the lyrics one long Sunday afternoon, and now I'm in the middle of writing the accompaniment. The melody is done. When I finish it, I will try to record it and put it up here.

And I'm working on editing a couple of projects. One is Mom Yerka's book, which I promise I'm working on! The other is my friend Jess's. Both are great, but I am excessively slow. Sorry. Someday soon you'll both get some notes from me.

To top all this off, my little brother is getting married next week. I am so proud of him, and I just love my almost-sister-in-law. But it is weird to think of him with a wife. We are hoping to go camping after the wedding day for a couple days, but we're having a hard time finding anyone who can join us. If you're free that weekend, let us know!

Anyway, love to all!

P.S. Only 660 words. :)