Sunshine + me w/ a camera = pretty pictures of mom's flowers

My Pretty Kitty

This is Sabrina, my adorable cat that I love to death despite the fact that I think I'm allergic to her.

Everyone needs some R&R

Relaxation: I honestly think I had forgotten the meaning of the word until this weekend. There is only so much relaxing a person can do with the knowledge that there are 10 million other things that you SHOULD be doing instead of that cutting into your down time.

But now that finals are done and work has been postponed (hopefully not too much longer), I've actually had a chance to just sit back and relax. Saturday my mom and I went to the Genesee Country Museum (a life size replication of a 1800-1900s town with real buildings donated mainly from the surrounding area); Sunday we went to visit my Aunt at her annual camp ground and hike around for a bit and kick my cousin's ass at scrabble; and today was filled with a whole lot of nothingness at home, which includes helping my mom garden and playing with my 2 dogs, Chloey and Kaylee.

Soon it will be back to reality with 8 hour work days and all the stresses of life, but until I get my work assignment I'm going to continue enjoying the much appreciated quite life.

Stress is an ignorant state. It believes that everything is an emergency. Nothing is that important. ~Natalie Goldberg

new computer!!!

So this is my first post from my NEW MACBOOK! My old laptop has been giving me problems for the past year, so I finally took the plunge and got the new computer I have been drooling over for the past 6 months.

This means no more having to wait 10 minutes (yes, i timed it...and it took 12 minutes to start up once) for my computer to function, no more blue screens of death during @ info sessions (yes this really happened), no more soslowityouthinkitwonteveropen moments, no more batteries dying after 45 minutes (if that), and most of all no more freezing and having to reboot. Efficiency is a wonderful thing :)

Ahh! It's so exciting! I'm having a blast playing around with all my new gadgets and learning how to use a mac after only ever having used PCs...yay!!!

Looking Through a First Grader's View

I spent an hour today in my little brother's elementary school cafeteria to have a *special* birthday lunch with him. It was especially crazy because the fifth grade class was having "Latin America Day" and there were colorful decorations and costumes everywhere. I must say that this surprised me and must be one of the benefits of going to a public school - more government money means more resources to do cool things.

Anyways, so I was sitting at the first grade table across between Emma and Nicky. Across from us were Lina, Lauren, Nicole and who could forget Carmen. Carmen is already a ladies' man and will undoubtedly be a heartbreak in a few years. He had girls on all sides of him, was constantly cracking jokes, and the girls were all over him. Its funny to think that some things are already apparent at the young age of 7. Nicole and Maddie were playing hand games (Concentration, Miss Susie, and the like) over him and he just sat there, nearly getting whacked in the face, eating it all up.

Next stop on the birthday festivity train: Chuck E Cheese with many of the same kids, followed by the family party at the house.

Delayed

So I had a call today with one of the grad students working on the eval project for work. The good news is there will be a lot for me to do. The bad news is I can't start on it this week. *sigh* Maybe I should be happy and look at this as an unexpected blessing because the only way I'll take a real break is if I'm forced to. So now I have a few more days of doing nothing :)

I didn't really know what to expect in terms of what I would be doing this summer, and to be honest this isn't what I would have expected. But it seems better. My biggest fear was that I would be stuck reading really dry articles about things I barely understood and not being able to apply it at all. I'm happy to say that this is nothing like what I'll be doing.

Basically, the professor we're working under went in to the Extension Office in NYC and started working with them to evaluate their programs in two areas: nutrition and health and youth development. They developed written evaluation plans and it was such a success that they have now been asked to expand into 6 other counties, working with their respective extension offices. In all, they've added 24 more programs to what they were already working with in NYC. For each site, they have gone in and done a 2 day launch, and one of the things I'll be working on this summer is helping them to "protocolize" this launch so that anyone can run it, not just our Director.

I'll also have a chance to work with the protocol that has been developed to assess what type of evaluation would work best depending on the program's stage of development. A lot of the stuff that needs to be done this summer involves actually documenting the processes they've been using and describing it so that we can turn it into a manual rather than have to walk them through the process each time in person. It's pretty neat stuff, and after spending a semester and a half reading dense evaluation articles I can see how this would fit into stuff that's already out there and how it would make things sooo much easier.

Ok, so this probably makes little or no sense to anyone but me, but I'm excited and if that makes me a dork, well then I'm fine with it.

WoooHOoooo

I'm OFFICIALLY a JUNIOR. This hellish sophomore year is finally over and I don't even care that my professor screwed me over on a paper I deserved an A on, or that I probably fucked up one or more finals. The important thing is I'M DONE.

And to commemorate the occasion I came back and did a "happy dance" down the hall with two of my residents. Damn, I really am going to miss this building. Ironically, I signed my housing contract for Hasbrouck today. God must have some sick sense of humor...

But I had a good uncle, my late Uncle Alex. He was my father's kid brother, a childless graduate of Harvard who was an honest life-insurance salesman in Indianapolis. He was well-read and wise. And his principal complaint about other human beings was that they so seldom noticed when they were happy. So when we were drinking lemonade under an apple tree in the summer, say, and talking lazily about this and that, almost buzzing like honeybees, Uncle Alex would suddenly interrupt and agreeably blather to exclaim, "If this isn't nice, I don't know what is."

So I do the same now, and so do my kids and grandkids. And I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, "If this isn't nice, I don't know what is."

~Kurt Vonnegut, A Man Without a Country

It amuses me that normal girls would take to the mall and purchase shoes or something to deal with the stress of finals, etc. But me? Not a chance (although I do have a special place in my heart for shoes)...I just go out and buy myself another stack of books I wish to read and some nice new pens and have myself a merry ol' time.

Like a Ton of Bricks

The biggest personality on my hallway just left for good, and i think it just hit me that the school year is over and i will not be coming back to my hall with my residents next year.

I'll miss them all like hell. The craziness that only McLLU seems to emit. Dahlia and Shariffa running down the hallway. Nick popping in and out of my room at the most random of times. Tea in exchange for good conversation with my lovely ladies, Paula and Adey. Tricia's encouraging words as we both studied late into the night. Ania's hugs, even if they are more often left on my white board than in person. The random messages left on my whiteboard and the fact that my residents updated my "Where's Lindsey" board more often than I did. Jasen and Kerone's playful bickering. Emma's mini-cupcakes. Everyone's obsession with my cookies/brownies. The random run-ins and conversations in the kitchen.

*Sigh* People come and go and memories fade, but the positive feelings I have about my McLLUie family will never change.

Running Out of Time

I'm running out of time to do everything I had planned to do between slope day and going home - studying, meeting with profs/ friends, study abroad app, organizing packing, miscellaneous projects - why is the biggest constraint always time?

I never really understood my one friend's preoccupation with death. She's an agnostic, and so death is the end all be all. It is the one thing that she is most afraid of because there is so much she wants to do before she dies. She views life as a race. How much can you do before your time is up? What can you contribute before your number gets called and you're gone for good?

At first this just seems depressing. But in reality, it just makes her appreciate every day more because you never know when your last day will be.

Make the most of every moment and live with no regrets.

Happy Thought of the Day

I screened my parents' call today and instead of finding another nagging voicemail, I got this:

"I wanted to tell you to come home soon. And my Pokemon cards can't wait to see you. Bye. This is Nicholas 787-17XX. Bye. I love you. Bye."

I can't believe this kiddo turns 7 in less than two weeks.

In need of change

In my unmotivated, ready-for-this-semester-to-end state my thoughts keep drifting to the future...

So here's the summer line-up as it stands now:

• May 20th: Home to Rochester
  
• June 6th: Back to Ithaca to move into my apartment with SYDNEY!!!!
• June 22nd-24th-ish: Pittsburgh for my cousin's graduation
• July 21-28th: Ocean City, MD
  
• July 30-Aug 1st: Playing "mommy" for my little sibs
• August 7th: Move into Hasbrouck and start RA training

The summer seems so short when laid out like that...boo.

Anyways, I'm really excited to not be dealing with all the Cornell bullshit for a few months, but I'm kind of worried that my research will make the summer much more stressful than it has to be - especially since I get to make up my own hours and work from home/ where ever, which means I have to be disciplined.

Ok, I just have to make it through 5 exams in the next 8 days and then I'm free - sorta. In the words of my friend Dory "just keep swimming, just keep swimming"

I don't understand

I don't understand why some people must face a harder path in life. I don't understand why there are those who are destined to be hurt, beaten, and bruised both figuratively and literally while others will never feel even a fraction of the pain. I don't understand why the overwhelming majority of people take notice and ignore, or never open their eyes to see all of the horrors some people are confronting in their every day lives.

I don't understand how we can all want the same things in life and go about such different ways of getting there.

I just plain don't understand.

Sunny Days Sweepin the Clouds Away...

Today is one of those days that makes me want to sit outside in the sunshine and sip iced tea all day long, pondering all sorts of things. It's the type of day that makes me happy to go to Cornell and happy that I'm staying here this summer.

Too bad Cornell has a sick way of torturing students: on the nicest of nice days we're all stuck in libraries and computer labs studying.

Are you happy or are you sad?

For a self-proclaimed optimist, I have become rather pessimistic and I don't like it. I've lost the unstoppable upbeat "we can" attitude I once had, and it is starting to make me question whether or not I ever really was an optimist at all.

In a strangely related, but much more happy note, our LC Retreat went incredibly well and I couldn't have asked for a better end to an incredible term on the leadership team. I'm officially a "NFT" (no fucking title) and I don't think it has really sunk in yet, but that's ok. Besides, just because I don't have a title doesn't mean my life won't still revolve around AIESEC. It just means if it does its by choice rather than obligation :)

As all endings of one journey and beginnings of another, it is bittersweet. But I have learned and grown so much in the past year, and if nothing else that is enough. And so my three year old sister's voice keeps popping in my head, as life begs the question "Are you happy or are you sad?"

Well, I'd have to say I'm happy more than anything. Happy to have been given this experience. Happy to have worked with these wonderful people and been challenged in so many ways. Happy to have had successes, and even happier to have learned from my mistakes. But most of all, I'm happy to leave the leadership team knowing that there is a strong, enthusiastic, and dedicated bunch of aiesecers filling the incoming team, and fleshing out the LC.

I wasn't very excited about this retreat and in all honesty come Saturday afternoon I would have much rather been sleeping than putting the finishing touches on paper-plate awards or my photo slideshow. I was being bitchy, tired, and completely unmotivated, that is until Syd stopped me right before starting the retreat. She pulled me aside and said "Linds, do you realize what you've done? Look around. If we had had this retreat last year there would have been 5 people who showed up--the leadership team." And she was right. Twenty-two people gave up their time to sleep and recover from slope day, as well as their Cinco de Mayo to haul it back to the cold 4-H camp for an @ retreat. Sure, it may not have been the whole LC, but it was enough people to have amazing reflections and discussions that will no doubt help make our LC even better and more unified going into the fall semester.

And so, while I may have become a pessimist I still can enjoy being proven wrong multiple times in one weekend. Yes, we should be critical of our shortcomings, but we should be just as proud of our accomplishments. All of our strategic planning has finally paid off and we now have a functioning LC.

While certain things (such as lack of sleep and looming finals) may be keeping me from being fully happy, I am content, which is ok by me.

Moral Dilemna

What do you do when you're stuck between obligation to two different people. On one hand, you do what you're supposed to do and 50 people aren't made slightly worse off, but you have to turn in a good friend. On the otherhand, if you do nothing everyone else gets stuck dealing with the ramifications of your friend's actions.

I know what the right thing to do is, but it doesn't make it easy or enjoyable.

Flashback

It's hard to believe an entire year has passed since my first encounter with the slope day mayhem that ensued last May. So many of the people that played an integral role in making those epic four days awesome were missing from my life so far this year, and it seems as though we will be reunited for this momentous occasion.

And while there are certain things that will surely complicate matters this year, I have no doubt that we will continue the tradition of having one hell of a good time. Mixing new friends and old, booze and shisha, and recklessness with RA responsibilities will surely lead to some interesting stories and great memories.

Slope Day Line Up:
Thurs: Unofficial last day of class, followed by Nach Baliye (urdu for dance crazily), which is @CN's internationally themed prom
Fri: SLOPE DAY: finagling my way out of my on-call 12-2 shift so as not to miss the big concert with TI and TV on the Radio, followed by god only knows what...
Sat: The Big Dick's end of the year bash (big dick= dickson you pervs), followed by the @CN LC Retreat
Sun: Retreat part 2 plus lotttts more boozin and snoozin

Somehow I feel like "poor life decisions" may be made this weekend, but eh, you're only young once.