The Time In-Between

Now, if there was anyone out there that knew me only from this blog (I'm pretty positive there isn't - God knows they would have gotten bored and wandered off by now), they would be surprised by numerous elements of that last post. Especially considering my last post was almost a year ago! I contemplated writing a separate post about my life in the intervening time, but upon reading the unpublished posts about my last travel assignment (the most interesting sentence mentioned "hopping the fence to whataburger in the town with the second biggest Eiffel Tower) I decided that a short summary would be more appropriate. So, here goes:

I spend 3 months alone in Paris, Texas, working at a newly opened pediatric clinic. It was a good job, and the people were very nice and small town-y. However, as far as excitement goes...well, there was that time I took an hour's drive to Eisenhower's birthplace and toured it with a middle aged married couple. Actually, my for-real favorite part was this super cool used book store that used to be an opera house in this tiny little college town that Jessie and I took a ghost tour of before she left. Did you know you can be a professional storyteller? Weird.

Anyway, I had a nice old guy neighbor who gave me cookies and pie, and a 2 minute commute (which is unremarkable considering you could drive the length of the town in 10 minutes - allowing for a few red lights).  When I was ready to fly back my Mom flew in to a tiny (as in "mom, what gate should I go to when I get there?" "Well honey- there appears to only be one gate.") airport and accompanied me on the rest of my trip home. Road tripping with your mother is seriously underrated guys! Well, actually, not every mom can be as cool as mine. I have the road trip karaoke videos to prove it!

I got back and met the guy I had been talking to online while I was in Paris (we'll call him Matt - because that's his name), and lo and behold, I love that nerd! We will be celebrating our 1 year anniversary very soon (yes, we're counting the long distance time before we met in person. It was very important to us and the formation of our relationship. Silence haters!)

I got a job working with kids within a couple weeks of returning. I'm still working there and I love it!

I lived with my parents for a while, but finally got an apartment in August. I really put down roots; I mean seriously, I bought a couch and a bed and my grandmother bought me a vacuum cleaner for Christmas. The worst part is that I was very excited to use that new vacuum. Beep beep! Boring adult coming through!

I split the holidays between my family and my Matt's family, and the season was devoid of bloodshed. I ran a 5k in downtown Rochester in December (a major goal of Matt's), and I wrapped all of my Christmas presents by myself. The end of 2014 leaves me feeling like I'm doing pretty well, and excited for the year to come.

Books - shelves, stacks, and piles of them!

Currently, I am sitting on a couch flanked by two stacks of books. One stack is books I've started in the past year and not finished, and one is the nonfiction books that I think my boyfriend would like. I am facing a shelving unit full of hardcover books, which my TV sits on. To the left of that, in the corner, is a shelving unit containing all of my paperbacks, alphabetized of course. In my bedroom, there is a small nook in my nightstand above the drawer. I thought it would be perfect for about 10 old-looking books. My point is that I have rented an apartment in the city, bought a couch and a bed and dressers and lamps and a chair and a TV and my favorite part of all of my new domain is my books. They are the objects of my fascination, portals to other worlds, and as much as I love the functionality of couches and beds and and dressers and lamps, I really really love holding the physical copy of a good book. The physical weight of knowledge - that is what I'll really miss when the abundance of e-readers makes my voracious buying of used books comical. And even then, I'm keeping my books. Go troglodytes!