February 20, 2010, 10:30 p.m.:
"Hey Mom, it's Allie. So, you know how I sometimes make huge and potentially life-altering decisions at the drop of a hat? Well, guess what."
If you are reading this, I presume you know who I am and how spontaneous I can be. I've switched majors more times than one should proudly admit, started a bell choir with extraordinarily little handbell experience (sorry, Meyer, but it's true), and decided to learn new languages and musical instruments simply because there was nothing good on TV. And as with most of my ridiculous decisions, my crazy summer adventure began with that late-night phone call to BHoff. But why, in the midst of my second semester of graduate school, did I decide to transport myself halfway around the world to become certified for a job that is not my intended career?
Because I felt trapped. As ridiculous as it may sound, I'd been in Boston for 4 1/2 years, in school the entire time, and I felt as if life was just happening around me, and I had been floating through it. Then grad. school came along, and the vehicle gods apparently replaced my slightly boring, yet floating, life-raft for a bumper car driven by a demonic 8-year-old hellbent on hitting everything in sight. This past year was the hardest year I've experienced thus far; it repeatedly pushed me to my academic, professional, and emotional limits, I didn't know what, if anything, I could do about it.
By February, I was done. I thought about applying to the Peace Corps and various other volunteer programs, but realized that I didn't want to put my degree on hold, but rather take control of my life again for the summer. That night, I saw some photos of a friend from BC who was in a TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) program in Florence, Italy, and decided right then and there that this was EXACTLY what I should be doing with my summer. Even better, there was a program in Seville (which happened to be the first city I'd ever heard of in Spain, thanks to my 6th grade teacher's obsession with ¡Sevilla!). Even my obsession with Latin America couldn't turn me away from this opportunity to live in Andalucía for a month--and so I signed up for the program, coughed up the deposit, and booked my flight that night.
Yes, Dad, it's ironic and slightly ridiculous that I'm traipsing halfway around the world to get a certificate in the same field I originally went to BC to study for an actual degree. Things like this are why you love me. And don't worry, roommates, I already bought my return ticket; you know as well as I do that if I hadn't, there's too good a chance that I'd up and move and become española with all the other cool kids. But for the next month (and considering the state of trans-continental phone calls, the time difference, and my own flightiness), this is going to be my way of ensuring the people I love that I'm still alive. And haven't run off with a gitano or decided to become the Spanish Maria Von Trapp.
I jest. Kind of.
