Friendship

I treasure nights like this when I am face to face with one of those wonderful people I have the privilege to call friends and am reminded of why I care for them as much as I do. Tonight I had tea at home with my best guy friend since freshman year. We have seen each other grow so much. I was so encouraged when he told me that I had grown into "an amazing woman" since freshman year. We both agreed that Paris was the turning point. So Sabrina, so cliche, but so true. And at the same time he called me out on a blindspot I have that is my eager embrace of intellectualism and that side of myself. Friends that can act as a mirror and can be honest with you are very rare, but he's one of those. And tonight I was reminded to embrace the person in all her glory and beauty that is Jenny, simply Jenny, aside from activities and accomplishments. No changing one fig leaf for another.


All that to say.... good things happen over a cup of tea

a thought...

I'm planning on going to Europe this summer, though I can't yet decide where I want to go. I like the idea of staying in one place for a while because I think it's a more worthwhile experience as opposed to going to 13 countries and spending only one or two days in each. Currently I'm playing with the idea of studying something somewhere for 1 or 2 weeks while I'm there. I really want to learn Spanish. Wouldn't it be amazing to learn Spanish in Spain??

Or study theology in beloved Oxford... Now that would be incredible.
go here: http://www.conted.ox.ac.uk/courses/international/theology.asp#whoisitfor

oh Thursday...

So today was loooong. I feel too tired to narrate, here are thoughts:

I work 8 hour days now, that's fun and means paying rent won't feel as painful.

I was talking to my roommate Summer about guys and its weird that we have to go OUT to meet guys because we won't just meet them in class or something. Not that I'm going to start hitting up singles' groups, but ugh nevermind I don't want to talk about it. Awkward.

I love my roommates! The three of us finally hung out together for a while. We talked about Allison's not-so-great blind date. Oh blind dates.... they're hell. But the stories are always worth hearing!!

Little Emma is so precious! The first part of my day is always a pleasure...

...but now instead of "The Girl who Owned a City" (remember that book??) I feel like the girl who swallowed a city. I now have a third job, well technically it's through the school district so now it's "miscellaneous income" on the paycheck I already receive. I'm a sub. teacher for the after school program and it's been heinous on my first two days. Apparently my 16 3rd graders who I'll have for about 2 weeks are "bad kids" and most of them are known by all the teachers at the school. Yikes. It is quite a challenge, which I like. I need to start planning some fun hands-on activities since they have sooo much energy! sheesh. I want to do that mentos diet coke geyser thing I saw on mythbusters a few months ago, but I don't know how I'd make it educational in a way that they would understand. We did fingerprinting today, that was sweet. Let me just say going from my 7 years of experience working one-on-one with kids with special needs to having 16 mischievious and often deceitful 3rd graders is quite a shift!

I do care about the kids despite themselves, which meant I had to do the hard part of that... I wrote up an abuse report for a kid. It's the first one I've done, but unfortunately I know it won't be the last.

Working and especially working at something I enjoy and challenges me is so incredible! Life is very good.