Life Gets In The Way

When wrapping up the spring semester and leaving campus with teary goodbyes, I made promises to a ton of people that we’d “Skype all the time” and definitely “stay in touch over Facebook”. But, life just gets in the way.

I’m not trying to make excuses. Ok…maybe I am because I’ve been so bad at Skyping—yes it’s a verb—people this summer. (And oh, for those of you who don’t know, Skype is a video chat messenger. If you don’t have it, get it!)


But it’s hard with the 3-hour time difference and with everyone working. By the time I get home from work it’s 10 o’clock here, which means it’s 1 o’clock there. Maybe if we were still in the dorms, 1 in the morning wouldn’t be so bad, but at home there’s reasons to keep quiet—like parents sleeping a few doors down. So obviously talking and laughing with your friend who’s all the way across the country is a little out of the question.

Plus, it seems like I’m always working when my friends are always free—and vice versa. It’s very frustrating. So instead, I’ve spent the entire summer dreaming of the upcoming fall when I’m finally reunited with my friends. Then we can Skype each other from down the hall, rather than 3,000 miles down the highway.

Hopefully next summer though I’ll be better with staying in touch. Facebook status updates and wall posts can only get you so far. Face-to-face is ten times better—and usually leads to more laughs.

If you have any tips on how to organize your summer time better or a fun way to keep in touch, leave a comment!

A Face in the Crowd

All last year as I was walking around campus, I would see people that looked so familiar. But I knew that I had never met them before, because I was so new to the school. Then, I started to put a name to the face. I kept seeing people who looked like those I went to high school with. It was as if I was trying to make something familiar out of a totally different environment.

Too often I saw someone that really resembled that one kid that I took biology with my freshman year in high school. Or like the one girl I worked with on an English project. It was weird that most of the people who I thought I saw were not even close friends of mine. I probably only talked to them maybe once or twice.

But now that I’m home, I’ve noticed that I’ve started to see people from college when I’m walking through the mall or waiting in line at a store. And, just like before, these are only mild acquaintances. I’m not quite sure what it means exactly, but I’m starting to think that something in my brain is making it seem like I’m surrounded my familiarity wherever I am.

I’ll be curious to see what happens when I return to school for my second year. Maybe I’ll stop recognizing people from home because I haven’t been in high school for a while; haven’t seen those faces in a while. Maybe I’ll finally be able to call my college the familiar.

Snail-Mail: Love from Across the Country

Ever since Facebook and e-mail has gotten so popular, snail-mail seems to have been thrown out the window. But personally, I check my mailbox every day in hopes that something fun will be waiting. In fact, the mailman usually comes around 12ish so I’m probably going to go check it after I post this.

My boyfriend and I are in a long distance relationship and we love to send letters back and forth. It’s a great opportunity to say everything you want, without forgetting or being interrupted. Plus, classic love letters are so cute and romantic.

Also, last year, I made 6 very good friends (who I miss so much!). We knew that we’d keep in touch over Facebook and Skype and what not over the summer, but I made sure to get everyone’s addresses so that we could send each other letters and postcards.

Letters are so special for a few reasons:

1. They're handwritten and hand-designed which means you can add fun drawings or even confetti for a little twist.

2. You can keep them forever and look at them whenever you need a pick-me-up.

3. You can say things that you maybe wouldn't really say otherwise, like telling them how great a friend they are.

It’s great to kick it old school and send a special letter to one of your good friends.

And, whenever I would go somewhere cool—like Yosemite or San Francisco—I would pick up a handful of postcards and send them out.

The only downfall to letters is actually making the time to sit down and write them. They aren’t something you can do while multitasking. So put the technology away and grab a pen and cute piece of paper. (I have obnoxiously bright paper that I love, which makes it even more fun!)

Your friends will love getting mail from you and hopefully they’ll even send you something back!

Playing Catch-Up

What I love already about this blog, is that it’s a great way for friends and family to see what I’m up to or what I’m thinking about, even when we don’t talk every day.

That was a plus for me on Facebook. It’s a great way to stay in touch—without actually staying in touch.

But this is so much more personal than that. It’s more than just status updates. It’s fun and in-depth.

It took me almost 2 days to figure out what I would call my blog, and then I realized how painfully obvious the answer was…

Last November, I saw this image on Photobucket that said “follow your heart”. Here’s what inspired it all:

Since then, I knew I wanted to get this as a tattoo. I scribbled it all over every notebook, post-it, and random scratch of paper. I loved what it meant and wanted it to be a part of me forever.

At first, I wanted to put it on my wrist, but then realized I didn’t like the way it looked. So then I started playing around with a few different places, until I settled on my ankle.

Three weeks ago, I got my first tattoo and it extends all the way from my ankle down to my foot. Here’s what it looks like:

So as I was brainstorming different names and playing around with puns, I put my feet up on the couch to get more comfortable. Then I saw the words on my foot staring back at me, and I realized how silly I was that I didn’t even think about that in the first place.

Cross Country Venture

Last year at school, upon telling people I’m from California, quite a few would ask “Did you drive here!?” I smirked at them and scoffed, “Of course not, we flew”.

Well the joke’s on me now. My mom and I have decided to drive my car across country. The ever-classic way of getting to college.

I’m anticipating our trip to follow the lines of “insert epic road trip movie here”. At first we’ll be very psyched and the first day will be full of adventure. Somewhere along the lines, one of us (possibly both of us) will snap for whatever reason. But, in the end, the trip will have brought us closer and the camera will pan out with us crying and hugging on campus.

Ok, so maybe no camera—but it will be a miracle if one of us doesn’t go mildly crazy around the 1,736^th mile.

Looking at the positives, my mom and I are really excited for our 3,146 mile journey. I’ve been doing a lot of research on some of the places we’ll see along the way. Sadly, the World’s Largest Ball of Twine is in the middle of Kansas and we’ll be taking a more northern route—through Utah, Wyoming, South Dakota, Minnesota and ten other states.

But, there are a lot of other cool stops along the way:

1. Mount Rushmore – This will probably be the first and last time I’ll see this impressive carving. We pretty much tailored our trip just so we could visit it. And plus it’s motivation to get through Nevada and Wyoming.

2. Independence Rock - If you played Oregon Trail you’ll know exactly what this is. I won’t lie when I say I’m super excited to go here!

3. Wall Drug Store - So apparently it’s just a drug store…but they have a really good advertising company. They have signs lining the highway, declaring how many miles away you are from it. There’s even one in the South Pole!! Check out the picture.

They may not be “cool” in the traditional sense, but I’m a geek and honestly can’t wait!

So that reminds me, the whole reason that I decided was to start a blog was to write about my 7-day journey across the United States. My mom is going to be writing her own as well (when she finally starts one, I’ll post the link). It should be really interesting to compare the two.

We leave in 11 days and counting.

Where to Begin?

There’s so many different ways that I could start out this first post, but I think I’m just going to dive right into the middle of it all.

I was born and raised in Sunny California and I absolutely love where I live. When it came time to start looking about colleges, I had no expectation of going out-of-state at all.

But, when I visited a beautiful campus in Connecticut, I fell in love.

Now there’s two things you have to know about me: (1) my heart knows what it wants; and (2) I’m very stubborn. Put these two traits together and you get one stubbornly determined girl.

So needless to say, I applied to this school that is roughly 3,000 miles away from home. Before I even got the acceptance letter, I was already dreaming of which dorm I would live in and where my favorite place on the quad would be.

So once it was official, I packed up my life on the Left Coast and set out to explore the East. I followed my heart across the country and don’t regret a single thing.

My freshman year went smoothly, but at times all I wanted to do was hop on a plane and be home. And of course, now that I’m home for the summer…all I want to do is be back at school. Oh, the irony.

Anyway, what I hope to do with my blog is to write about my experiences and feelings while being away at college, to post a few tips, and to generally entertain anyone who is away from home (whether you be 3 minutes or 3,000 miles away).

Since practically everyone who’s gone away from school knows what it’s like to step out of their comfort zone and start a new life, I hope that there will be many people who feel free to comment and interact through my blog.

So here we go, and don’t forget to “follow your heart”.