Summer

Last summer was a total failure for me, and this summer is shaping up to be much the same. I don't think I'm going to Japan. It's mostly my fault, but I still hold that the professor did not let me know he was actually running the program this semester like I asked until less than a week before the application deadline. And that's really not long enough to get a letter of recommendation. Especially from a Japanese professor b/c you have to be all formal about it.

Anyway, so that's dashed. Now I've been thinking of other ways to spend my time. I was talking about this with K and that's when he brought it up.

"Come stay in KC with me this summer." It was like 2am and we were laying in front of the TV in my family room, watching the Food Network. "Hm?" "I don't have to live in the dorms they assign me to. I could live in an apartment. They give me a 500 dollar a month stipend." "Oh." "So you could work in KC and live in an apartment with me." I consider this, and clearly still am otherwise this wouldn't be a post. It's not like the work would be any different in Indy or KC. I'd get a job at a retail store or maybe even a doggie hotel or something similar where I'm working with animals. I'd love to do something to do with teaching, but since I haven't had any classroom time or even taken a teaching course I doubt I'd be allowed to do much more than observe. And it certainly wouldn't be paid.

"We're too young to live together, even if it's just for a summer," I finally say. "Well, I'm not. And you're old for your age." I don't really know how to respond to this. It's true. He'd be 22 and I'd be 20. It's not like others my age don't spend the summers with their boyfriends. It's just not something I pictured in my life until now and I'm really struggling with it. It's a good option. I just can't get my mind to accept that as an option.

So there's that. It's an option. It'd be nice. It'd be cheaper to live at home and I could help out a couple of racing families and maybe even take photos at races and make some money from that on top of working at some job. I'd be around my family a lot, which I both like and dislike. It's more comfortable and safe.

Or I could just go somewhere else completely. I keep seeing the Disney internship fliers and even though I know you're basically Disney's bitch, being in Florida or Anaheim doesn't sound so bad. I could go to Africa and teach English or maybe just work, building infrastructure in rural areas. I'm also tempted to work for a cruise line, but from what I hear you have to devote 9 months to that and there's no way in hell I'm doing that. On top of all that, there's a 6 week program in Greece run by the English department. Kind of a bummer that the deadline has already passed, but I bet if I really expressed interest my teacher could get me in.

So I dunno. What do you guys think? Any other options just off the top of your head? It's March so most internship deadlines have passed, and I'm not looking for that anyway. But...it's plenty of time to plan for a job over the summer. And that's what I'm trying to do.