I Am Reborn

I'm starting this blog now because my life is at a good starting point. I'm starting graduate studies at University of Illinois in Urbana/Champaign in about a week. I've already left my home behind, and I'm currently in a state of limbo, like a soul waiting to be reborn. Right now I'm mostly pessimistic about my move to Urbana, but to understand why you'll need a little background info.

I did my undergraduate studies at Whitman College in Walla Walla, WA. At first, I was very sad that I had to leave my friends behind, and didn't really make any new friends (I'll probably tell you about my beliefs on different levels of friendship later) till my sophomore year. Whitman was an amazing experience though, and so was Walla Walla. I love that city and would be happy if I ended up back there some day. After graduating in Biology, I took a year off, because by the time I had realized that I liked school enough to do it for 5 more years, it was too late to apply to grad schools. In my year off, my girlfriend Lyndsay and I traveled through Thailand and Vietnam for two months in the winter.

Just before I left, Lyndsay and I both applied for grad schools. Our attitude was that we should both seek out programs and schools independently, but be sure to apply to a few of the same schools so we would have the option of going to school together. Long story short, I made some mistakes, missed quite a few deadlines, and only applied for three schools. Of those three I was only accepted to UIUC, a school that Lyndsay did not apply to. After heart wrenching debate, I decided it would be best if I took the opportunity at UIUC even though that would take me physically away from Lyndsay, my home in California, and all my friends. I'm still not sure this was the best decision.

So Lyndsay ended up at Colorado State University in Fort Collins doing Chemistry. And for the next year (at least) we will be busy grad students in love separated by about 16 hours of highway 80. This is my story.