last day of classes: check

And now that it's night, with a little Modest Mouse singing out of these speakers, I'm ready for a new day. I'm ready to be more than I've been... to make something out of these daily scraps of letters and ink that I've jammed into my notebook's bready pages.

To echo a post from sometime last September, "It's a new dawn, it's a new day, it's a new life... and I'm feelin' good," (that's, again, thanks to a Nina Simone song).

I had decided to check the archives on my blog to remember what I'd been thinking about a year ago. My writing seemed a little more interesting, to be honest. More idea-centered and intellectual, or something. (Notice the present drip in my tongue--the laxness, if laziness, of my sentences.) Perhaps it had something to do with the fellowship of students and faculty who were actually reading and interested in the materials we were studying. Or, even if not interested, we were at least somewhat invested (or attempting to be) in what we were studying.

Now it seems I am perpetually living with the "grass is greener" syndrome. But I'm also remembering things from under a probably-overly-nostalgic light. What I may be remembering of my undergraduate life wasn't all enjoyment from the gaining of knowledge. It wasn't all a bunch of over-achievers and people who made you want to be better and smarter and work harder. It was that, but it wasn't only that. And the experiences I'm gaining today are significant in ways that I cannot know yet.

I'm still making imaginary plans to move to Germany and work there for a time--a year or so--but I'm running up against my own imaginary walls. The Congress-Bundestag Youth Exchange for Young Professionals, for example, is a program designed to place young people who are actively pursuing particular professions (thought I'd make it tongue-twistery) into internships or paid positions of work. They're not interested in people who don't really know what they want to do, or whose ideal line of profession is not something that can be boxed in with their list of businesses or contacts. My fear is that I will never be able to mentally fit myself into one of these boxy "professions," and therefore, I will never make it back to Germany for any length of time where I'd be able to strengthen my language skills and contacts there... This is all so self-centered of me.

My purpose in life is not to fulfill my desires for my life, but to give my life over to my good Lord and let his good plan for my life direct my steps. And maybe he wants me to pursue things that may not be my own personal desires. I guess I wouldn't say that teaching English as a foreign language was necessarily my desire upon graduation, but it was and continues to be necessary.

I know this. My head knows it, yes. But, still I find myself reverting back to those old man personal drives... All these applications for things intimidate me. I don't know what to say. I don't know why they would pick me...

That's right. It's not about me. You may need to remind me.