Dear Maria

Today- FINALLY- and probably short-lived the sun came out! So I was pretty inspired to write =) also, I just had an amazing conversation with asst 2 and I'm going to just go ahead and publish it. I went to a Georgetown graduation ceremony last night and I looked around me and thought to myself "i have this feeling that after rwanda i have ABSOLUTELY no clue what i'm going to do."

I have all kinds of possibilities- I will only be 25 years old and will have amassed about 50 years of experiences, stories, and life altering choices. 25. If I'm lucky, I've only lived the first 1/4 of my life (oh yea, my stubborn self is totally going for 100!) and I've gotten to do so much. Meet celebrities, attend historical events, drink in bars that are famous, live in a city that is exciting, pay more in rent than my parents pay in their mortgage, and NOW- NOW I'm going to AFRICA!!!

And there is so much more that I want to do. I want to go to Burning Man. I want to live in Manhattan. I want to live in Los Angeles. I want to own a house in Indiana. I want to teach a class. I want to fill up my passport.

Maybe i'm just not meant to do this whole career til ya die thing. Right now, I don't love my job everyday I come into work- I get through the day- then prepare myself to get through the next day. I want to be so excited about what I'm doing. and- I don't want to settle until I find it. Maybe Africa is an interlude- but maybe, hopefully- it's a door that has been just dying to open for 24 years. Perhaps, I will be lucky enough that it is going to be the door that leads into something brand new and exciting.

So, when i leave DC, i'm leaving with a high heart- even though i like to complain about the city- there is no way would i have had it any other way. I would have dated the guys I dated, drank the amount I drank, lived in the scary basement apartment I lived in (perhaps I would have decided to take my laptop with me during that whole robbery thing- I really miss that little mac). I have gotten to live an entire 18 years worth of life in less than three years and I've never had to think "what if."

SO in closing, I want to end this with a quote from my friend Sam. He's lead an amazing life, he's young, a beauftiful family, he has an awesomely successful business- and his business is quite literally "Catalyzing social change with youth." It is a career that I envy so much.

"if this economic meltdown has taught you anything let it be that there are more important things than a career. let it be that you need to live, because you never know when things can be turned upside down."*

*disclaimer: I didn't get that exactly right, since it is from memory and it was about 3 weeks ago he said that. Sam if you're reading, go ahead and comment the quote below =) =)