Something terrible has happened.

Last night I was doing my normal bedtime thing-- I had just laid down with a pillow between my knees and one fluffed perfectly under my head and my precious blanket (that's right, blanket) pressed to my face, and I was watching Conan. The night's guests: John Krasinski, Patton Oswald, and someone else that I knew I wouldn't be awake for.

Let me take a moment's pause from my story to let you in on something. I am in love with John Krasinski. I know that millions of women across America are in love with Jim Halpert. That's great; Jim Halpert is beyond sexy. But John Krasinski, the actor... wow. I am 100% convinced that if we ever met (fingers crossed), it would be love at first sight. Fireworks would erupt out of nothingness, and an epic love story would ensue. Evan knows all this, and I think he's coming to grips with the potential loss.

Back to my story. So I'm watching Conan, and I'm totally psyched about John Krasinski's appearance. After the initial joking and a funny story about John's obscenely tall brother, the conversation moves to Jim and Pam on The Office. Spoiler alert: Jim and Pam are engaged. Next thing I know Conan uttered these terrible words, "Now, you're also engaged, is that right?"

And yes, he is.

I'm going to pull the ultimate catty-girl line now and say, "She's not cute enough for him."

and the beat goes on.

Okay, I have at last been productive.

Reference letters: check.
Statement of purpose: written.
Resume: updated.
MAT: taken.
Application: started.
Homework: done.

Ready for: weekend.

Meanwhile, my birthday is Monday. 22 is a weird age because it's the first age in a while where there's nothing to really look forward to. 10: double digits. 13: teenager. 15: learner's permit. 16: license. 17: R-rated movies. 18: register to vote. 19: legal adulthood. 21: legal to buy alcohol. 22: one step closer to thirty.

So it's my first birthday ever where I'm not sure if I should be excited about. I mean, I've really enjoyed being 21. Young, in college, and still on my parents' tab (although, if I do get into grad school, hopefully that won't change... hint, hint, Mom). As I approach 22 at warp speed, I'm beginning to realize that I'm...older. People my own age are engaged, pregnant, in the real world... but we're babies. Or at least that's how I feel. I can't file my own taxes or make a yearly budget; I can barely make my own doctor's appointment.

One more reminder that I'm growing up: I ordered my cap and gown today. I'll pick it up between 8 and 2 on December 18, and then I'll march across the stage, shake Dr. Gouge's hand, and into the world of job searches and (hopefully) grad school I'll go. After that will I finally consider myself an adult? Probably not.

Plan B if grad school doesn't work out: Swedish tour guide.

Getting this in order. finally.

E-mails requesting reference letter: sent.

Reference letters acquired: two. (waiting for one more)

MAT prep book: bought.

Grad school application: started.

Things to do:
- Write statement of purpose.
- Recreate resume (my recent PC-->Mac merger destroyed my resume, but nothing else).
- Register for MAT.
- Take MAT.
- Finish application.
- Pray that this is, in fact, God's will for my life.
- Wait.

Since I've been in such a frazzled mood lately (greatly taken out, I'm ashamed to say, on sweet Evan), I'm going to list all the things I'm thankful for... what's that cliche? "I'm too blessed to be stressed."
Things that make me smile:
- My favorite jeans.
- Pandora.
- The family atmosphere at work.
- Dr. Pepper lip balm.
- Auburn football.
- Sweet tea and lemonade, mixed together. I believe it's called an Arnold Palmer. Thanks, Arnold.
- The chillbumps I get when Spirit flies over the student section.
- Fake designer purses bought in scary Chinatown basements.
- Entrance exam study books and practice tests.
- Inside jokes.
- Fun blogs about adventures in foreign lands.
- Playing "Things" with all my favorites.
- Chinese take-out and endless episodes of Friends and Scrubs.
- Planners.
- Jim Halpert.
- To-do lists.
- Hooded sweatshirts and UCA soffe shorts.
- Dorky e-mail forwards from my mom, always featuring a picture of some animal being 'hilarious'
- Foreign accents.
- Fresh raspberries.
- Wanda's mom's Friday lunches at work.
- Random text messages from Lauren that always include some ridiculous memory.
- Wedding pictures (see: abryanphoto.com, thanks Alice).
- Sermons by Scoggins, my wonderful FBCO pastor
- Dinner at Newk's and long talks about life and love with Jane.
- Jewelry that my mom wore in high school making a come-back in my wardrobe.
- Having to make myself stop listing things because my life is just that blessed.

I promise I'll be more positive next week.

grad school.

It has suddenly occurred to me that if I don't get into grad school, there is not a single thing I'm qualified to do. I'm a Human Development and Family Studies major. You do the math.

I have to find 3 professors that I'm buddies with, that can vouch for my being a good student and hard worker. Here's the problem: I am a good student and hard worker, I am not buddies with any of my professors. Discussion in my classes was often controversial and sometimes very self-centered with lots of personal stories. I'm just not one to share my life story with 35 strangers, and definitely not defend my opinions (read: I don't perform well under pressure).

It's one of those days when I just can't shake the stress.

I should probably be spending this time writing important e-mails to professors I never really talked to...

Living the dream.

Today I'm not exactly content with my life.

Although new to the blogger world, I'm quickly accumulating (or "following" as the locals call it) blogs that my friends are posting. When I say friends, I mean people I have met in college who have pursued a much bolder path than me. Two dear friends are in Hong Kong for two years, one is in England, and one-- I just found out-- is in the Dominican Republic. And here I am...

in Alabama.

Sure, I enjoy my internship. I'm learning, and I love the people I work with (although, I'm quite certain that I do not want to work in social work). And yes, I'm looking forward to grad school, assuming I get in. But there is no adventure here.

Craziest thing I've done all week: Chinese take-out and Season 1 of Friends.

I don't know exactly what I want, and I know I can't up and leave the sanctuary of my home alone. But there's a longing within me... I want to build houses in Africa, or work in a college ministry in England, or be a travel guide in Sweden, or teach English classes in Mexico. I'm not sure the timing is right, but in the meantime I'm squirming under the (caution: melodrama ahead) oppression of living here in my comfort zone.

I've travelled far from home and more often than most, which creates an internal struggle like you wouldn't believe. On the one hand, I feel like a prat complaining that I'm not out there somewhere on a safari or life-changing adventure. On the other, I am not innocent anymore. I have felt the surge of energy as you step out of the cab onto a cobbled Swedish street, felt my heart race as I boarded the tube in frenzied London, and felt chill bumps cover my arms as I stared up at the Roman Coliseum. And from time to time, I can barely stand it. I want so badly to go back, to see more, to do more, to revisit things as a traveller rather than a foreigner. I have this overwhelming sense of, "If I knew then what I know now..." and I want to do it all over again. At the very same time, though, I want to see everything I've never seen before... the Eiffel Tower, the Greek ruins, the Wall of China...

Back here in reality, I'm sitting at a cubicle in Small Town, Alabama. Tonight I'll teach a class of people my parents' age; they'll be more interested in telling me about their children or asking about my own dating life than listening to me give them advice about their own. And who can blame them? I'll cap off the night with So You Think You Can Dance and a trip to the gym. All the while knowing that across the "big pond" my friends are discovering life in Europe, Asia, and so forth.

My apologies for this depressing post. Someone please send me somewhere.

Think of a pleasant memory.

Yesterday in class we asked the participants to think back on pleasant memories of their childhoods.

Our purpose here was to discuss being an intentional family, spending time together on purpose... making memories on purpose.... making life happen instead of letting it happen to you.

A couple of the participants insisted that they had no pleasant memories, which was shocking and sad. I hope, in this particular case, that they were only being difficult and choosing not to participate. Eventually most of them came up with at least one, but it was just one more time where I thought of how privileged I am and how blessed.

I couldn't help but think back to my own childhood, and my mind spun with a million different memories all competing for the number one spot.

I remembered when my family moved into a duplex in Moulton. My brother and I took the biggest boxes and made them into rocket ships. We laid on our backs and drew buttons on the interior of the box (we picked up on the horizontal positioning after watching Apollo 13). We spent what seems like hours in hindsight simulating take-offs, pushing buttons and talking to ground control with authority.

I remembered making up "dances" with Adam. He, an avid wrestling fan, would convince me that we were making up cheerleading dances, and I willingly complied. In reality, Adam was testing out pile-drivers, diamond cutters, and figure fours (all wrestling moves) on me. Music videos played on the television in the background, and he'd set the "dance moves" to 8-counts. We would do our "routines" over and over again on a quest for perfection in the rec room. I don't recall ever questioning whether or not our dances were in fact dances, but I do remember being highly disappointed when Adam suddenly realized he was playing with his little sister and moved on to better, cooler things.

I remembered being at the beach with Rachel. We always shared a room with twin beds (Adam slept begrudgingly on the pull-out sofa bed), and we would lock him out and turn the bedroom into our personal playhouse. We'd jump from bed to bed, pretending to be Wendy and Peter Pan. We'd watch pedestrians on the sidewalk out our windows and make up stories about how they were robbers or newlyweds or immigrants.

I remembered the very special days when Mom let Adam and me finger paint in the kitchen floor when we were very little. She'd spread newspapers out and dress us in old t-shirts, and we'd paint our masterpieces as much on the newspaper as on our construction paper.

I remembered going on a road trip to Williamsburg, Virginia. I studied up on Pocahontas and John Smith before the trip and proudly announced facts about them from the backseat. Mom would distract Adam and me from fighting by asking us Trivial Pursuit questions and rewarding us with Gummy Life Savers. In the rare moments of peace, Adam and I would perform "surgery" on each other in the backseat using things we found in the floorboards. With a pen as my scalpel, I successfully extracted a battery from Adam's forearm. He later removed a tattoo from my arm with a blanket and an eraser.

I remembered making up dances to Mariah Carey songs with my childhood friend, Erica. We'd practiced into the early morning hours, listening to Fantasy over and over again.

So many good memories and such a blessed life. I really could go on, but there are more memories to be made. For instance, my co-worker is now performing a Boys II Men song on the other side of the cubicle.

Goal setting.

We started our September session this morning, and it's going to be a doozie.

We were talking about goals in today's session, and one woman confessed that one of her goals is to have a better relationship with her child's father. I found this goal to be optimistic and respectable, but apparently not everyone did. Another student, Dutchess*, yelled, "Ain't no need! That ain't a goal! They ain't worth it!" Dutchess, in fact, has an opinion about everything. We made lifelines too, listing highs and lows of our lives and encouraging everyone to end on a high note because they were all in a program set up to make positive changes in their lives. Dutchess assured us that too much was going on in her life to list on one sheet of paper.

We get a lot of this particular personality, this mindset that "My life is harder than yours." These are the people I dub difficult. They're a walking contradiction: they're quick to tell you how terrible their situations are, how their lives are falling apart at the seams, but they've got it all together and they have all the answers and they're not interested in help.

It's days like today when I'm torn between laughter and frustration. The antics are funny, but the attitude is miserable.

I made my own lifeline....

O Cheerleading (Make fun if you want, but I looooooved it)
O The Squad-- my three best girl friends in high school
X Worst break up of my life
O High school graduation/move to Auburn
X Lauren went to another college far, far away
O Alpha Delta Pi
X Learning that I must study to be as successful in college as I was in high school
O Auburn. It's the happiest I've ever, ever been.
O Panhellenic Counselor.
O Evan
X Leaving Auburn
X/O Lauren gets married. Saying goodbye to a married best friend is so bittersweet.
O Living in the same town as Evan. World of difference.
O Internship.
O Making new friends in my new home.
O Looking forward to grad school....

That's what I wrote on my paper.

In other news... I'm going to be an aunt. Not biologically, but I'm going to claim Rachel's baby as my niece or nephew regardless. People all around me are getting pregnant or engaged. Literally, all of Evan's friends are engaged and a couple of mine are far behind. Now Rachel's pregnant, and so are two of the women at my internship site. Oh, and Evan's roommate... he's going to be a daddy.

I'm beyond starving. Must break for lunch.

*Dutchess is not her real name.

Another slow day.

15 minutes to go.

The thing about this internship is a lot of times I'm so busy my head spins. For hours, I'll run around 'campus' taking care of business.... then, suddenly, I'll run out of things to do. I spend just as many hours doing absolutely nothing as I do working diligently.

Here's what I do in my spare time:
-Read blogs.
-Write in my blog.
- Facebook.
- Facebook.
- Facebook.
- Write e-mails.
- Peruse urbanoutfitters.com
- Read biographies on imdb.com
- Comment on pictures on Facebook.
- Listen to Pandora.

I'm running out of things to capture my attention.

In other news, the Harvey Family Reunion was a huge success, I think. I'm so comfortable with them that I've been referring to it as 'my' family reunion. There was live music, loads of food, Trivial Pursuit, and lots of picture-taking. On the other hand, I had to go to bed at 8:30 last night because I was totally, completely exhausted. We all went to bed around 4 am, but, while everyone else slept late into the morning/afternoon, I was up when the first ray of sunshine hit my sensitive eyes.

Friday I'm going to Auburn, and I am so completely unabashedly crazy excited. I may start packing this afternoon, but I'll try to hold off. Eeeeek!

I think it's time for a lay-out change, if I can figure out how... That's what I'll work on for the last 8 minutes of my day.

Good day.

Weagle, weagle...

College football is finally here.

I have been fighting the excitement for some reason (likely, that I just didn't want to get caught up in the "crowd"... a weird complex I developed in high school). Or maybe I thought I was above such nonsense, the only one who recognized that it's just a game. But, much like the swine flu sweeping the nation, the college football spirit is highly contagious, and I have, at last, been infected. This weekend the Eagle will soar, the Tide will roll, and all the other teams in the SEC will do their things...

Now I'm wishing I were clever enough to keep that last sentence going... the Dawgs will... growl? the Gators will... chomp? That's why I didn't continue in the first place.

I'm in Tuscaloosa doing an internship that I'm quite happy with, dating a guy that I'm very in love with (read: I'm happy here, promise), but Auburn is where my heart of hearts is during football season. My family and many of my friends goad me incessantly about "seeing the light" and "finally being in God's country," always hoping that I'll, supposedly, come to my senses or catch Bama fever. Now hear this: not gonna happen. Tomorrow's game is a small one as far as school rivalries go, but my heart aches when I think about missing it. I can picture it. I can feel it.

The RVs arrived Wednesday, Auburn flags flying high. The tailgaters are sitting around their camps, clad from head to toe in burnt orange and navy. Smoke swirls into the sky from smokers and grills dotted throughout campus. From every building on campus, a banner billows and declares, "Beat LA Tech!" or something far wittier. Students, all wearing their favorite worn Auburn t-shirts, walk with a spring in their step and find it difficult not to stare longingly at a stadium that come tomorrow will be roaring and filled to the brim with rabid Auburn fans from near and far.

Tomorrow one of the many proud eagles will glide around the edges of a twilit stadium, and Auburn and LA Tech fans alike will be goose-bumped. Pre-game videos will remind every ear in the stadium what it means to be an Auburn Tiger: Pride. Honor. Honesty. Human Touch. Tradition. And because Auburn men and women believe in these things, I believe in Auburn and love it. Students will chant interchangeably, "Bodda getta, bodda getta..." and "Weagle, weagle..." Aubie will create a ruckous doing hilarious, adorable Aubie things because that's what Aubies do. The band will march out, only after the drum major runs and leaps dramatically across the field, and spell out AUBURN TIGERS to the tune of the fight song: War Eagle, fly down the field! Ever to conquer, never to yield! War Eagle, fearless and true; fight on, you orange and blue!... And then. Oh, and then. The best part. Through clouds of fog, to a crowd gone berserk, a host of Auburn Tigers will run onto the field with their new (able) coach.

I have to stop there because I can barely stand it.

War Eagle.

War Eagle.

"And my brother... well, I call him Stupid."

Currently listening to: For Once in My Life by Frank Sinatra (I include this because I am of the strong suspicion that what I am listening to dictates the tone of my writing).

Last night was Round 2 of class at the Salvation Army with the homeless veterans. As I have come to expect, these classes are momentous and moving and encouraging.

We talked about communicating with people and building strong families. One man shared about all his siblings and their strengths (although, one he called Stupid seemed not to have strengths... but it did make me laugh). Another man shared about a friend of his that was like his family, and I knew immediately what that was like. During the break, a silent man in the back apologized for what might have come across as rudeness and let us know that he had lost his entire immediate family to a string of tragedies. And all these comments were such that I began to think about my own families' strengths.

(I think I've done a post similar to this before but, as I'm convinced that no more than 2 people read this, I'll carry-on as though just for myself.)

My mom is a rock. She carries our family because she is logical and caring. She plans and budgets and works tirelessly to be sure that our lives run smoothly and with as little disruption as possible. She is always there to put my life into perspective, to build me up when I'm down, and to take me down a few notches when I get ahead of myself. And at the end of the day, she's content and so put-together.
My dad is my hero. He is strong and never afraid to try anything and so, so smart. He's magnetic in a way that draws crowds from all ages, through his musical talent or just his humor. And even beneath the showman, he's sensitive and good. He writes poetry for my mom because he loves her in that old-fashioned way, and I know he still has a hard time telling me 'no' because I'm his baby girl.
My brother was precious to me and everyone he met. He had a contagious smile and bright eyes. He cared deeply for those closest to him, and he was a prayer warrior at an astonishingly young age. Fiercely loyal and affectionate, he often let me know that, aside from being his incredibly annoying little sister, he loved me dearly.
Lauren, more a sister than just a friend, is funny and random and spontaneous but also incredibly responsible and organized. After a bad break-up in high school, she brought me Grapico, raisinets, and gossip magazines-- all my favorite things. She's one of the only people I've ever been able to just sit and be with, in silence or in giggles, in mindless chatter or in tearful conversations about lost love.
Rachel is easily the cousin I am closest to, not because we have spent the most time together but because we are so very alike in many way (but entirely different in others, too). She is affectionate and warm, artistic and feminine, athletic and beautiful. She was my idol growing up because, being six years older than me, she was always at the stage I wanted to be.

Those are the people I would consider in my most "immediate" family, although I could write a paragraph of nice things about anyone in my family, I think. I am so incredibly blessed, and the sweet veterans last night reminded me of that in a loud and resounding way.

My favorite, because he shares the most and wants to get the most out of the program, shared yet another funny story (one that may or may not translate across cyberspace). We were talking about negative people and their impact on our lives, that they will bring you down faster than you can bring them up, and Sam* raised his hand to tell a story. He told of dating a girl years ago who was so negative he could barely stand it, but so pretty he could hardly walk away. After months of dating and listening to her constant complaints, one night after dinner he offered to go out and get her favorite dessert-- apple pie and ice cream. He said, "I left... and I ain't never been back! She's still waitin' for that pie!" Everyone in the room cackled and rocked in their chairs. For a moment I couldn't help but pity the lovelorn woman waiting for her promised pie, but I have to give it to Sam... the man's got style.

Happy Hump Day to anyone sweet enough to drop by my little blog.

*Sam's not his real name.