25 before 25

1. Visit the Great Wall of China
2. Run 10km in under 55 minutes
3. Bake a pie from scratch
4. Wear dresses more
5. Become adept at Photoshop
6. Write a short story
7. Begin to understand financial matters
8. Work on my abs
9. Take up flossing
10. Significantly reduce my pop consumption
11. Be a more adventurous eater
12. Do the Penticton river run this summer
13. Maintain some French
14. Take Taylor to Silverwood
15. Do 3 unassisted chin-ups
16. Send letters and postcards and care packages
17. Get a nice(r) camera and learn how to use it
18. Become a Yes Man
19. Experiment with being gluten-free
20. Turn Jeffrey into an outdoor cat
21. Go to the World Expo in Shanghai
22. Enjoy summer mornings on the deck
23. Challenge myself as a teacher
24. Remember the secret
25. Be grateful to turn 25

(inspired by my topography.)

oh panic

okay, i'm just gonna come out and say it.

i'm having pre-china panic.

i suppose that is totally normal but i was expecting this to arrive on about august 15, four days before i leave when i realize the sheer enormity of the adventure i'm embarking on, not on june 20ish with two months to go. i can find a few reasons about why this is happening right now. the first is that i started writing my "25 before 25" life goals and i realized that i have no idea how to write goals for while i'm in china and i'm going to be in china almost the entirety of my 24th year. the goals are general, vague, and as soon as i finish them up (5 to go - suggestions are welcome) i'll post them up here. the other is that in nova scotia all my friends were talking about doing the regular immersion program during the school year and making plans to visit and discussing their wide open futures and they could do anything! and i just panicked, realizing that really, for the first time in my life, i've made plans that are non-negotiable. i'll be in china until at least this time next year and it's set in stone. that freaks the shit out of me. i suppose that's what it means to be a grownup. i am 24, after all, and the only thing i'm tied to is a contract. for a job. where i'll get paid a substantial amount of money. in china. i am really excited about it. but I'M GOING TO CHINA! WTF! sometimes, with taylor or jenna or whoever, we'll just have moments of:
"i'm going to china"
"you're going to china!"
"that's crazy!"
"i mean, china!"
"i know!"
"i can't believe it!"
"me neither!"
and then we laugh but really i'm like "oh god i'm going to china i'm not ready to go to china what if i don't like it what if i get food poisoning what if there is a pandemic what if it's too hard what if i'm not a good teacher what if i don't have the right clothes what if the kids don't like me what if i'm not ready in time oh god i'm going to china!" i'm actually not afraid about china, i'm sure it's an awesome place, but just the leaving. the being gone. i'm already missing things and people i haven't even said goodbye to.

probably i will look at this in a few days (weeks? months?) and laugh but right now i am not laughing.

okay, laughing a little. but not because it's a joke. only because i feel silly. someone tell me i am just being normal!

shlog

je veux ecrire quelque chose en francais, mais c'est difficil parce que mon clavier n'est pas en francais et je ne veux pas prendre une heure pour checher les accents.

so i'll write this bad boy in english. i like that i'm blogging a bit more now. not consistently, really. not yet. but more than i have in a couple years. it's nice to build up the ideas for a few days (ok, weeks) and then spit them out. or sit down and hammer something out really quick. long story short, i'm enjoying this blog thing again. even if it isn't as important to me as it was when i first got it going. i'm still going to find a new space before i go to china. i thought the china blog would be a travel blog, but really it'll be a life blog. my life will be in china. that's an interesting thought.

i'm home from nova scotia. i wish i could define all the ways that being there changed me, but it's impossible. it was easily the best thing i could have done and not because of the french, although the french was awesome, but because of the place and the people and what it did to me. believe it or not (i know you believe it), i'm not very good at letting people in or creating relationships and social situations make me all kinds of awkward. but it was different there and i came away from it with a gazillion new friends, 4 or 5 that i consider to be good friends, really good friends, and just a new perspective. i would like to rewind time and go back there. any day of the week, and week of the session, it was all just so fucking good. but no can do so i'm just trying to be all zen and focus on how grateful i am for the experience. and that is a whole lotta grateful.

anyway. that's all for now. i have a gazillion chores to get done, a gazillion trips to take (think: edmonton, vancouver, saskatoon, coeur d'alene, china), and a serious sleep debt i need to repay. this will be the first wednesday in six weeks that i won't be totally annihilated drunk, my body is thankful but my mind is not.

franglais

i want to write something about being here but i don't know how. i'm a different person here, that's for dang sure. i don't think i'm any more or less different than myself, it's just a strange environment. like cramming all of first year res into five weeks. think: drinking, last minute homework, frisbee, drinking and generally goofiness. but i'm 24 now and a little bit more mature (ha! joke!). i get drunk at least 3 nights a week and we have an ongoing promise to have at least one beer a night. i live in the best residence on campus, in my opinion, and we call ourselves a family and say cheesy stuff like "toujours tout le monde" and "on a gagne dans nos coeurs". tonight our residence is hosting a keg party and i'm dressing up like a 1950s housewife. but i actually really love the dress i'll be wearing, even though i can't really do kegstands in it. the director of the program bought me a beer on wednesday night and we spent about ten minutes talking about when i would come back to the university and working on my pronunciation of the word "but". that one definitely gets me. i have an awesome roommate but when i'm drunk i sleepover with my friend down the hall. sleepover isn't a euphemism for anything, by the way. i listen to french music, watch french tv shows, read french books (sorta) and when i get drunk i go from intermediare 3 to advance 1. and sometimes i sneak into my room and listen to abba with my headphones in. i can drink almost anyone here under the table yet i've only been hungover once. and when i start feeling trapped there is always someone willing to walk down to the kwikway, to the beach or to play tennis/frisbee/soccer/basketball/etc. with. i feel like this is probably the best thing i could have ever done with my life right now. a full on let loose fun time before i jump into a "career". what the fuck, eh? me? career? those words do not belong in the same sentence. but alas, here i am. i'll start thinking about that when i get back. but really. i have one week left here. which is actually a fairly substantial amount of time but it'll fly by and then it'll be time to say seeya later. in english!

anyway, that's the news. i'm loving it. but really, as each day goes by i start thinking more and more about the things i need to do to get ready for china and i'm ready to get that started too. plus, my car and my cat miss me. i know they do!

i get emails from club nintendo. true story.