Month: May 2007

okay, okay

Okay, here’s an update.

I graduated on the 19th. It was kind of like turning 18 — a lifetime of anticipation, but when you wake up, well, it doesn’t really feel all that different. I have moments when I feel proud to be done, moments when I wonder what the hell took me so long, and — the majority — moments when I wonder just what the hell that piece of paper sitting in a tube in a box in a cluttered room of boxes is really going to do for me.

The cluttered room is full of boxes — instead of just unboxed clutter — because we’re getting ready to move in June. Now that I no longer have to drive to Westminster every day, there’s no reason for us to be in southern York County where our social life consists of talking to the Starbucks girls. My favorite days are those when it’s the cute Starbucks guy at the counter, but they are few and far between, and I’m ready for something a little more diverse.

So Mechanicsburg it is.

I had dreamt of living in Harrisburg proper, of going to city council meetings and walking along the river, but when I think of what life is likely to actually hold, it doesn’t include the time or energy for deep involvement in city politics, nor the willingness to deal with on-street parking, flooding, or a lack of grocery stores.

We’ll be moving just a mile or so from the new Wegmans, and while we won’t be within walking distance of the Susquehanna, our deck (and our bedroom!) will overlook the Conodoguinet, but from a great enough height to make it safe from floods. It’s enough to make me forget any philosophical issues I have with living in the ‘burbs.

And what will I be doing with my days? I’ll be working. And working on applying to grad schools. The latter part of that is important, because Harrisburg offers very few opportunities for a recent graduate to put her English degree to work, and the more I think about the more sure I am that I need to do something I couldn’t have done sans degree, if only to preserve my sanity. College was fun and rewarding and it got me out of working a real job for a couple of years and blah blah blah, but in this postmodern age we all want direct and immediate results, and I’m still looking for those. I mean beyond the enormous additions to my library.

When it comes time to move, it turns out hoarding books doesn’t seem like such a great idea after all.

roast this

I’m feeling a little guilty about this, a little scared to admit to it, but I guess the only thing to do is ‘fess up and hope for the best.

I’ve started a new blog, but it’s not what you think.

I asked for green coffee beans for Christmas. That’s coffee that hasn’t yet been roasted. My family has a $15 gift limit, so I figured I’d get a pound or two of coffee — just enough to try it out, see if it was something I’d be interested in doing on a regular basis. Instead, though, my grandmother, who is not bound by the limit, gave me something like eight pounds of beans.

It’s taken until this past week for me to gather the equipment, time, and guts to try roasting. It was easy and fun, and the coffee that resulted was so good and so different from any coffee I’ve ever had before that I was pretty much immediately hooked. Also, I still had almost eight pounds of coffee left to roast. All the coffee roasting sites I’ve read say you should keep a log of all your roasts — and since I found it hard to believe that I’d actually take pen to paper, well, I figured I’d start a blog.

You can find it at www.roastthis.com. I don’t plan on it replacing this one, but no promises on frequent updates. As if you didn’t already know that.

done

I just spent the drive home from Westminster thinking about, among other things, what I would blog now that I no longer have anything I can point to as more pressing. I figured I’d write something about how it feels to have written my last (undergraduate) paper, what my McDaniel experience has meant to me, and what the hell I’m going to do with my life. It turns out that all I want to do is veg.

If you haven’t gleaned it already, today I completed the last of my work for the last of my classes. I also tied up all kinds of loose ends related to a number of extracurricular activities, checked my campus mailbox, and cleared the remaining balance off my student debit card (which cannot be converted to cash) via the purchase of a sweatshirt.

All that’s left is the graduation ceremony, a week from tomorrow. For now, I’m going to go do something mindless.