Day -3: Moving Out

Goodbye home! I leave today. My mom is sad. My dad is sad. My sisters are also sad. My best friend is sarcastic, as always. "Truly, I do not deserve you," she says through a mouthful of delicious free pizza. I hope she will share.

But yeah! I'm finally leaving home, 3 hours later than I wanted. I'm off to Cashmere to see the boyfriend for New Years, and then to Spokane.

I may be a little teensy weensy bit excited.

 

The view of the Cascade mountains was especially lovely today, I will miss that.

Day -5: This blog is about to get personal

Yesterday night I finally resolved to face my problem. Something is stressing is me out and giving me anxiety, and it has overstayed its welcome. So what does this mean for the next few months? I really don't know, and I'm really worried.

Being sick is annoying enough, I don't want to be sick a bajillion miles away from home and my favorite tea and stuffed animals. Eating is difficult enough. It will be more so where the food is unfamiliar. I anticipate there being plenty of new stressors in Guatemala and Nicaragua; how will my body self-destruct in response to them? I don't imagine I'll get a break from the stress I already have.

And how do I face this? I don't know that, either. It's not like I can punch Mr. Anxiety in the face, and even if I could, I'm a small person and probably wouldn't hit very hard.

Day -10: To Do List

(Additions Dec. 28, Day -6)
In the 1 week I have left at home, I must:

• Make a cool blog like Camina's 
• and make it purty
• Plan group projects for Guatemala
• Change Spanish minor to a major and double check that I can still graduate 
• Secure scholarship money
• Get a backpack
• and fill it with stuff
• Get a camera (done!)
• Make that tiny travel-sized laptop work (done that too!)
• Get a Bible that has not had nail polish remover and coffee (from previous owners) spilled over 1 Corinthians and is smaller than the average brick (done!)
• Hiking with friends at Lake 22 (abandoned because of weather)
• Find Dom a better Christmas present. Apparently a first person zombie shooter game isn't "me" enough. What, does he want a purple unicorn? 
• Calculate number of tampons necessary for 4+ months abroad 
• Pick up typhoid vaccine 
• Pick up fancy fast-drying travel towel that I am super excited to use
• Find presents for host families
• Make cute photo albums for host families
• Read a book
• Bake cookies
• Admit that my room now belongs to Grandma, and put my stuff in boxes
• Resign myself to leaving my bookshelf behind
• Reduce/manage Pre-Trip Parental Anxiety
• Pretend I have all this under control and there is totally enough time to reasonably do everything.